THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


GIFT  OF 


Commodore  Byron  McCandless 


/  lA 


HimiDAL  Al  OTHER  Mimi 


BY 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 


EDITED    "WITH    A^T    IlSrXRODTJCTION 


BY 


DAVID  H.  WHEELEK. 


FUNK  &  WAGNALLS  COMPANY 
New  York  ano  London 


Entared,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1888,  by 

FUNK  &  WAGNALLS, 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress  at  Washington,  D.  C 


?K 

CONTENTS. 

FASE 

I^'TRODUCTION, 5 


y-X  A  Siding  at  a  Railway  Station,     ....  41 

7 

II.  Thk  Norway  Fjords,  ....  .62 

III.  A  Cagliostro  of  the  Second  Century,          .        .  102 

tw.  Social  Condition  of  England  in  the  SixTiiENTii 

Centujry, 136 

V.  Coronation  of  Anne  Boleyn, 173 

VI.  John  Bunyan ISl 

VII.  Leaves  from  a  South  African  Journai-,       .        .  187 

VIII.  A  Day's  Fishing  at  Cheneys,    .                ...  232 

IX.  Thomas  Carlyi-e  and  His  Wife,       ....  246 

X.  PoLTTfCAL  Economy  of  thk  Eighteenth  Century,  256 

XI.  Heynard  the  Fox, 263 


957381 


INTRODUCTION 


This  collection  of  the  more  popular  writings  of  Mr. 
Fronde  is  made  in  order  to  enable  a  large  nnmber  of  read- 
ers to  obtain  at  small  cost  a  good  view  of  the  merits  and 
value  of  his  works.  His  best  known  essays  are,  for  the 
most  part,  left  out  of  this  volume — for  example,  those 
on  Calvinism,  Progress,  Education,  and  Ireland.  The 
editor  has  also  passed  by  in  the  selections  those  writings 
of  Mr.  Froude  which  have  been  the  subject  of  heated 
controversy.  It  is  hoped  that  the  sketches  of  travel, 
essays,  and  extracts  from  the  gifted  author's  historical 
works  here  collected,  will  be  found  both  entertaining 
and  instructive.  Believing  that  the  reader  will  like  to 
have  some  account  of  Mr.  Froude  and  his  opinions,  the 
editor  has  prepared  the  following  sketch. 


HIS  EDUCATION. 


James  Anthony  Froude  was  born  near  Totness, 
Devon,  England,  April  23,  1818.  His  father  was  an 
old-fashioned  High  Church  clergyman,  and  his  brother, 
Richard  Ilurrell  Froude  (fifteen  years  older  than  the  his- 
torian) had  already  won  distinction  as  a  new-fashioned 
High  Church  clergyman  when  James  Anthony  entered 
Driel  College,  Oxford,  at  the  age  of  eighteen.  The 
younger  Froude  was  naturally  thrown  l)y  his  family  con- 
nections and  syinpathies  into  the  strong  arms  of  the  new 
reformers  at  Oxford.     His  gifted  brother  died  the  same 


6  INTRODUCTION. 

year,  at  the  age  of  tliirty-three,  having  produced  a  mass 
of  new- reformation  literature,  which  has  since  been 
pubh'slied  in  four  vohiines.  Jolm  Henry  Newman, 
now  Cardinal  Newman,  had  succeeded  Richard  Hurrell 
Froude  as  the  leader  of  the  Oxford  Movement,  and  young 
James  Anthony  was  caught  up  and  carried  along  on  the 
tide  of  that  strange  reaction.  Newman  mastered  easily 
the  younger  men  about  him,  and  even  "  Newmanized 
some  of  those  who  had  already  been  Arnoldized.  "*  Credo 
in  Newmaniim  was  a  profession  of  faith  that  fell  from 
many  lips.  The  air  was  full  of  a  strange  sort  of  spiritual 
electricity.  Young  Froude  graduated  in  184:0,  two  years 
later  became  a  fellow  of  Exeter  College,  and  in  1845  was 
ordained  a  deacon  of  the  English  Church.  So  far  he  had 
been  borne  along  by  a  mighty  current.  Newman  had 
invited  him  to  assist  in  the  work  of  writing  the  lives  of 
the  English  saints.  "  Flattered,"  as  he  says,  by  the 
honor,  he  prepared  in  1812  the  "  Life  of  St.  Neot," 
which  was  published  in  the  series  under  Newman's  editor- 
ship. In  1815  John  Henry  Newman  left  the  English 
for  the  Catholic  Church  ;  a  counter-reaction  set  in. 
Alarmed  by  the  discovery  that  Newman  had  led  them  a 
long  journey  from  their  original  faith,  many  of  the 
younger  men  began  to  study  the  ground  traversed  with 
so  much  enthusiasm  ;  among  these  was  young  Froude. 
The  result  of  his  studies  and  reflections  appears  in  the 
remarkable  little  book  having  the  title  "  The  Nemesis  of 
Faith,"  first  pritited  in  1819.  Having  satisfied  himself 
that  he  could  not  be  a  j^riest  of  the  Church  of  England, 
Mr.  Froude  gave  up  his  fellowship  and  the  clerical  pro- 
fession. Under  the  law  as  it  then  stood,  he  could  not 
enter  another  profession,  and  having  tried  his  hand  at 
literature   with   success,   he   naturally  joined  the  great 

*  The  reference  is  to  Arnold  of  Rugby. 


INTRODUCTION".  7 

pi'iesthood  of  the  press.  In  liis  controversy  with  Mr. 
Edward  A.  Freeman,  the  historian  of  the  Norman  Con- 
quest, Mr.  Fronde  wrote  in  1879  the  following  account 
of  his  change  of  vocation  : 

"  I  entered  Deacon's  orders  in  1845.  To  take  orders  was  at 
that  time  a  condition  for  the  tenure  of  a  fellowshii^.  I  found 
myself  unfitted  for  a  clergyman's  position,  and  I  abandoned  it. 
J  did  not  leave  the  Church.  I  withdrew  into  the  position  of  a 
lay  member,  in  which  I  have  ever  since  remained.  I  gave  up  my 
Fellowship,  and  I  gave  up  my  profession  with  the  loss  of  my  ex- 
isting means  of  maintenance,  and  with  the  sacrifice  of  my  future 
prospects.  Had  I  been  '  the  false  prophet '  which  Mr.  Freeman 
elsewhere  politely  terms  me — had  I  been  as  iiidiflferent  to  truth, 
as  forgetful  of  the  obligations  of  honesty,  as  he  tells  his  readers 
that  I  am — is  it  likely  that  I  should  have  left  a  beaten  highway 
of  life  on  which  the  going  forward  is  so  easy  and  so  assured  ?  Is 
it  likely  that  I  should  have  selected  instead  to  make  my  way 
across  country  on  the  back  of  literature,  where,  besides  the  nat- 
ural difficulfTl's,  the  anonymous  reviewer  is  waiting  to  trip  the 
unhappy  rider  at  every  fence,  or  clamors  at  him  as  a  fool  like 
the  enchanted  stones  on  the  mountain  in  the  '  Arabian  Nights  ? ' 
Is  it  a  reproach  to  leave  at  such  hazards  a  profession  for  which 
a  man  finds  himself  unqualified  ?  Would  it  not  be  an  incompara- 
bly greater  reproach  to  have  yielded  to  the  temptation  and  re- 
mained in  it  ?  Is  it  not  enough  that  the  existing  prejudice  on 
this  subject  bars  a  man's  way  to  every  regular  employment  which 
he  might  have  looked  for  otherwise  ?  Is  it  fair,  is  it  tolerable, 
that  Mr.  Freeman  and  the  Saturday  lieriewer  should  avail  them- 
selves of  that  prejudice  to  point  to  my  Deacon's  orders  as  if  they 
were  an  ink-blot  and  a  mark  of  shame  ?" 

The  prejudice  against  an  honest  man's  change  of  his 
religious  opinions  has  died  out  in  this  country,  and  lost 
8ome  of  its  vitahty  in  England  ;  but  in  1850  it  still  had 
the  power  to  deal  terrible  blows.  No  small  man  could 
have  made  Mr.  Fronde's  chanije  and  outlived  the  evil 
consequences  of  it.  It  will  now  be  agreed  by  enhghtened 
men  that  the  one  and  only  honest  thing  to  do  was  what 


8  INTRODUCTION. 

James  Anthony  Fronde  did  when  he  resigned  botli  the 
duties  and  the  rewards  of  an  Englisli  clergyman.  The 
whip  is  reserved  in  our  day  for  the  back  of  the  hypocrite 
wlio,  having  changed  his  creed  still  keeps  his  salary. 
We  raise  no  question  of  the  value  of  the  old  opinions  or 
the  new.  It  is  only  necessary  to  say  that  the  more 
radical  of  the  new  opinions  of  Mr.  Fronde  are  preached 
from  Christian  pulpits  all  over  the  world,  and  have  been 
for  a  score  of  years  the  object  of  world-wide  criticism  and 
the  inspiration  of  a  vast  research  into  the  authorship,  his- 
tory, and  authority  of  different  books  of  the  Bible.  At 
Oxford,  Mr.  Froude  was  held  to  have  apostatized,  not  to 
have  changed  his  opinions  ;  for  Oxford  did  not  in  1850 
really  believe  in  the  right  of  private  judgment  ;  in  other 
words,  it  did  not  admit  a  man's  right  to  have  any  opinions 
on  questions  decided  by  the  Church.  One  consequence 
of  Mr.  Fronde's  heroic  devotion  to  good  conscience  has 
been  a  perpetual  conflict  between  him  and  one  section  of 
the  clergy  ;  and  it  is  scarcely  necessary  to  dwell  upon  the 
fact  that  in  this  war  the  historian  has  given  as  many  and 
as  good  blows  as  he  has  received. 

To  no  one  else  will  the  memory  of  John  Henry 
Newman  be  so  much  indebted  in  the  next  century  as  to 
James  Anthony  Froude  ;  their  opinions  are  as  wide  apart 
as  the  poles,  but  a  manly  sympathy  and  admiration  for 
courage,  independence,  and  loyalty  to  convictions  glows 
through  the  sentences  in  which  the  historian  describes 
the  leader  whom  he  abandoned  for  conscience'  sake. 
Newman's  own  "  Apologia  pro  vita  sua"  is  not  worth 
ten  hues  of  Fronde's  essay  as  a  vindication.  In  our 
youth  we  used  to  hear  mnch  abont  hating  the  sin  and 
loving  the  sinner  ;  it  may  be  doubted  whether  many  of 
us  mastered  it.  An  easier  thing  is  hard  for  us  ;  we  can 
Bcarcely  condemn  a  man's  opinions  and  retain  affection 


iXTRonrcTiox. 


and  even  reverence  fur  the  man  himself.  Froude  abhors 
the  sort  of  Roman  Catliohcism  whicli  Newman  restored 
to  power  in  EngLand  ;  but  he  has  given  Newman  such 
wholesome  praise  that  the  great  "  pervert"  will  need  no 
other  credentials  with  posterity.  Why  ?  The  tractarian 
agitation  sent  two  groups  of  men  flying  on  opposite  roads  : 
one  group  went  to  the  Catholic  Church,  the  other  went 
m^t  of  their  pulpits  into  the  lay  ranks.     Both  groups  left 

""all  they  had  behind  them.  Their  sacritices  to  the  truth 
of  their  souls  were  and  remain  their  common  possession  ; 
their  costly  renunciations  of  incomes  and  honors  were 
and  remain  their  conmion  claim  to  the  respect  and 
admiration  of  mankind.  The  men  whom  posterity  wih 
suspect  of  treachery  and  vindictiveness  are  the  men  who 

>^followed  Newman  to  the  door  of  the  Catholic  Church, 
but  stopped  outside  of  it,  and  remained  in  the  enjoyment 
of  their  emoluments.  When  they  strike  or  inspire  the 
blows  rained  upon  Mr.  Froude,  men  who  believe  in 
manliness  f,s  the  first  quality  in  religious  character — the 
highest  proof  that  one  has  known  Jesus  Christ — will  sus- 
pect that  the  smiters  were  cowardly  and  self-seeking  in 
the  day  that  tried  them  all  as  by  fire.  The  resentments 
of  the  camp-followers,  when  they  have  any,  fall  upon  the 
soldiers  who  win  honor  at  the  front.  If  there  still  be  in 
the  world  people  who  do  not  know  that  a  man's  opinions 
may  have  the  most  sacred  claims  upon  his  conduct,  and 
still  be  altogether  vanity  as  measures  of  the  truth,  then 
such  peo])lc  should  be  placed  in  some  school  where  the 
first  principles  of  toleration  are  taught.  Happily  we  are 
pretty  well  agreed  in  our  respect  for  courage,  sincerity, 
and  self-abnegation  ;  and  we  are  almost  as  unanimous  in 
holding  that  we  can  admire  John  Henry  Newman  and 
James  Anthony  Froude  Avithout  making  the  smallest 
effort  to  swallow  the  opinions  of  both  or  of  either. 


lU  _  IJS'TliODUCTION. 

Mr.  Fronde's  life  has  been  that  of  a  laborious  and  con- 
scientious man  of  letters.  Such  a  life  has  few  points  of 
interest  except  such  as  concern  his  work.  And  in  the 
case  of  Mr.  Froude,  everything  of  importance  except 
his  work  happened  before  he  was  thirtj-two  years  of  age. 
In  the  essay  on  "The  Oxford  Counter- Reformation," 
our  author  gives  us  a  glimjjse  of  his  boyhood  : 

"Our  own  household,"  he  writes,  "  was  a  fair  representative 
of  the  [clerical]  order.  My  father  was  rector  of  the  parish.  He 
was  archdeacon,  he  was  justice  of  the  peace.  He  had  a  moderate 
fortune  of  his  own,  consisting  chiefly  in  land,  and  he  belonged, 
therefore,  to  the  '  landed  interest.'  Most  of  the  magistrates' 
work  of  the  neighborhood  passed  through  his  hands.  If  any- 
thing was  amiss,  it  was  his  advice  that  was  sought  after,  and  I 
remember  his  being  called  upon  to  lay  a  troublesome  ghost.  In 
his  younger  days  he  had  been  a  hard  rider  across  country.  His 
children  knew  him  as  a  continually  busy,  useful  man  of  the 
world,  a  learned  and  cultivated  antiquary,  and  an  accomplished 
artist.  My  brothers  and  I  were  excellently'  educated,  and  were 
sent  to  school  and  college.  Our  spiritual  lessons  did  not  go 
beyond  the  Catechism.  We  were  told  that  our  business  in  life 
was  to  work  and  to  make  an  honorable  position  for  ourselves. 
About  doctrine,  Evangelical  or  Catholic,  I  do  not  think  that  in 
my  early  boyhood  I  ever  heard  a  single  word,  in  church  or  out  of 
it.  The  institution  had  drifted  into  the  condition  of  what  I 
should  call  moral  health.  It  did  not  instruct  us  in  mysteries,  it 
did  not  teach  us  to  make  religion  a  special  object  of  our 
thoughts  ;  it  taught  us  to  use  religion  as  a  light  by  which  to  see 
our  way  along  the  road  of  duty.  Without  the  sun,  our  eyes 
would  be  of  no  use  to  us  ;  but  if  we  look  at  the  sun  we  are 
simply  dazzled,  and  can  see  neither  it  nor  anything  else.  It  is 
precisely  the  same  with  theological  speculations.  If  the  beacon 
lamp  is  shining,  a  man  of  healthy  mind  will  not  discuss  the  com- 
position of  the  flame.  Enough  if  it  shows  him  how  to  steer  and 
keep  clear  of  shoals  and  breakers.  To  this  conception  of  the 
thing  we  had  practically  arrived." 

The  autobiographical  element  in  the  article  from  which 


IXTRODUCTION.  11 

we  have  just  quoted  brietiy  will  repaj'  us  for  a  momeut's 
further  study.  That  Mr.  Froude  was  misled  aud  bewil- 
dered at  Oxford,  and  almost  beoame  a  Iligli  Churcli 
clergyiua'n  of  tlie  Church  of  England,  or  possibly  a 
Roman  Catholii*.  priest,  under  the  influence  of  Newman, 
he  does  not  say  in  plain  Avords.  He  does  say,  however, 
"that  it  is  "  disagreeable  to  go  back  over  our  own  past 
4jiistakes,"  and  that  he  "  cannot  like  the  sow  that  was 
Svashed,  return  to  wallow  in  repudiated  superstition. ' '  If 
these  words  have  a  taste  of  bitterness  in  them,  we  may 
find  sweeter  thoughts  in  other  parts  of  the  essay.  The 
author  repeats  over  and  over  again  in  new  forms  his 
practical  philosophy. 

>.  "To  raise  a  doubt  about  a  creed  established  by  general  accept- 
ance is,"  he  declares,  "  a  direct  injury  to  the  general  welfare. 
Discussion  about  it  is  out  of  place,  for  only  bad  men  wish  to 
question  the"*"rule  of  life  which  religion  commends.  When  the 
Oxford  movement  began,  England  was  orthodox  without  being 
theological.  .  .  People  went  to  church  on  Sunday  to  learu  to  be 
good.  The  clergy  were  generally  of  superior  culture,  manners, 
and  character,  who  promoted  honest  living  by  precept  and  exam- 
ple. If  a  clergyman  was  poor,  it  was  still  his  pride  to  bring  up 
his  sons  as  gentlemen  ;  and  economies  were  cheerfully  submitted 
to  at  home  to  give  them  a  start  in  life — at  the  University,  or  in 
the  Army  or  Navy." 

In  the  essay  on  "  The  Oxford  Counter-Reformation," 
Mr.  Froude  recalls  one  of  the  forces  which  worked  upon 
him  in  his  young  manhood.  The  episode  will  be  espe- 
cially interesting  to  Evangelical  Americans. 

"  After  I  had  taken  my  degree,  and  before  I  entered  upon  resi- 
dence as  Fellow,  my  confidence  in  my  Oxford  teachers  underwent 
a  further  trial.  I  spent  some  months  in  Ireland  in  tiie  family  of 
an  Evangelical  clergyman.  I  need  not  mention  names  which  have 
no  historical  notability.   .   .  There  was  a  quiet  good  sense,  an  in- 


12  INTRODUCTION". 

tellcctual  breadth  of  feeling  in  this  household,  Avhich  to  me,  who 
had  been  bred  up  to  despise  Evangelicals  as  unreal  and  affected, 
was  a  startling  surprise.  I  had  looked  down  on  Dissenters  espe- 
cially as  being  vulgar  among  their  other  enormities  ;  here  were 
persons  whose  creed  differed  little  from  that  of  the  Calvinistic 
Methodists,  yet  they  were  easy,  natural,  and  dignified.  In  Ire- 
land they  were  part  of  a  missionary  garrison,  and  in  their  daily 
lives  they  carried  the  colors  of  their  faith.  In  Oxford,  reserve 
was  considered  a  becoming  feature  in  the  religious  character. 
The  doctrines  of  Christianity  were  mysteries,  and  mysteries  were 

not  to  be  lightly  spoken  of.     Christianity  at was  part  of  the 

atmosphere  which  we  breathed  ;  it  was  the  great  fact  of  our  ex- 
istence, to  which  everything  else  was  subordinated.  Mystery  it 
might  be,  but  not  more  of  a  mystery  than  our  own  bodily  lives 
and  the  system  of  which  we  were  a  part.  The  problem  was  to 
arrange  all  our  thoughts  and  acquirements  in  harmony  with  the 
Christian  revelation,  and  to  act  it  out  consistently  in  all  that  we 
said  and  did.  The  family  devotions  were  long,  but  there  was  no 
formalism,  and  everybody  took  a  part  in  them.  A  chapter  was 
read  and  talked  over,  and  practical  lessons  were  drawn  out  of  it  ; 
otherwise  there  were  no  long  faces  or  solemn  affectations  ;  the 
conversations  were  never  foolish  or  trivial  ;  serious  subjects  were 
lighted  up  as  if  by  an  ever-present  spiritual  sunshine.  Such  was 
the  new  element  into  which  I  was  introduced  .  .  .  ;  the  same  uni- 
form tone  being  visible  in  parents,  in  children,  in  the  indoor  ser- 
vants, and  in  the  surrounding  society.  And  this  was  Protestantism. 
This  was  the  fruit  of  the  Reformation  which  we  had  been  learn- 
ing at  Oxford  to  hate  as  rebellion  and  to  despise  as  a  system 
without  foundation.  The  foundation  of  it  was  faith  in  the 
authority  of  Holy  Scripture.  .  .  .  Here,  too,  the  letter  of  the  word 
was  allowed  to  require  a  living  authentication.  The  Anglo- 
Catholics  at  Oxford  maintained  that  Christ  was  present  in  the 
Church  ;  the  Evangelicals  said  that  he  was  present  in  the  indi- 
vidual believing  soul,  and  why  might  they  not  be  right  ?  So  far  as 
Scripture  went  they  had  promises  to  allege  for  themselves  more 
definite  than  the  Catholics.  If  the  test  was  personal  holiness,  I 
for  my  own  part  had  never  yet  fallen  in  with  any  human  beings 
in  whose  actions  and  conversation  the  spirit  of  Christ  was  more 
visibly  present.  My  feelings  of  reverence  for  the  Reformers 
revived.     Fact  itself  was  speaking  for  them.  ...  I  felt  that  I 


INTRODUCTION.  13 

had  been  taken  in,  and  I  resented  it.     Modern  history  resumod 
its  traditionary  English  aspect." 

HIS   WORKS. 

Mr.  Fronde's  earliest  literary  work  was  a  "  I-ife  of  St. 
Neot,"  brought  out  in  the  series  of  "Lives  of  the 
Saints,"  under  the  editorship  of  J.  H.  Newman.     At  the 

'^time  it  was  written  the  young  author  was,  as  we  should 
say  in  this  country,  just  out  of  college.  "  When  I  was 
.asked  to  assist  [in  preparing  the  series],  the  proposal," 
he  says,  "  pleased  and  ilattered  me.  I  suppose  now  that 
the  object  was  to  recommend  asceticism,  and  perhaps  to 
show  that  the  power  of  working  miracles  had  been  con- 
tinued in  the  Church  until  its  unity  Avas  broken.      But 

^no  such  intention  was  communicated  to  us.  We  were 
free  to  write  as  we  pleased,  each  on  our  own  responsibil- 
ity. For'*inyself,  I  went  to  work  with  the  assumption 
which  I  thought  myself  entitled  to  make,  that  men  who 
had  been  canonized  had  been  probably  good  men,  and  at 
least  remarkable  men.  It  was  an  opportunity  for  throw- 
ing myself  into  mediseval  literature,  and  studying  in  con- 
temporary M'ritings  what  human  life  had  really  been  like 
in  this  island,  in  an  age  of  which  the  visible  memorials 
remained  in  churches  and  cathedrals  and  monastic  ruins. 
I  do  not  regret  my  undertaking,  though  I  little  guessed 
the  wilderness  of  perplexities  into  which  I  was  throwing 
myself.  .  .  I  could  not  repeat  what  I  found  written,  for 
the  faith  was  wanting.  Concerning  the  character  of  this 
Life  of  a  Saint,  Mr.  Fronde  indirectly  gives  us  his  own 
judgment,  in  his  "  A  few  Words  on  Mr.  Freeman.' 


?5 


"  Did  Mr.  Freeman  ever  read  that  life  ?  Is  there  any  trace  of 
fanatirism  in  it  ?  I  wrote  an  account  of  St.  Neot  at  the  request  of 
a  person  for  whom  I  had  a  profound  personal  admiration,  ]mt  he 
would  smile  at  the  supposition  that  I  was  fanatical  or  cajjable  of 


14  INTRODUCTIOSr. 

fanaticism.  In  my  reading  on  that  occasion,  and  in  my  subse- 
quent hagiological  studies,  I  found  myself  in  an  atmosphere 
where  any  story  seemed  to  pass  as  true  that  was  edifying.  I  did 
not  like  my  occupation  and  I  drew  out  of  it." 

It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  in  his  essaj  on  "  Tlie 
Lives  of  the  Saints,"  Mr.  Fronde  not  onlj  treats  the 
subject  with  decorum  and  dignity,  but  also  gives  a  phi- 
losophy of  asceticism  which  is  highly  honorable  to  the 
saints. 

"  Without  speculating  on  the  why,  the  Christians  felt  that  in- 
dulgence in  animal  passion  did,  in  fact,  pollute  them,  and  so  much 
the  more  if  it  was  deliberate.  .  .  .  Christianity  would  present  the 
body  to  God  as  a  pure  and  holy  sacrifice,  as  so  much  of  the  mate- 
rial world  conquered  from  the  appetites  and  lusts,  and  from  the 
devil  whose  abode  they  were.  This  was  the  meaning  of  the  fast- 
ings and  scourgings,  the  penances  and  night-watchings  ;  it  was 
this  which  sent  St.  Anthony  to  the  tombs  and  set  Simeon  on  his  pil- 
lar, to  conquer  the  devil  in  the  flesh,  and  keep  themselves,  if  possi- 
ble, undefiled  by  so  much  as  one  corrupt  thought.  .  .  .  They  did 
their  work,  and  in  virtue  of  it  we  are  raised  to  a  higher  stage — 
we  are  lifted  forward  a  mighty  step  which  we  can  never  retrace. 
Personal  purity  is  not  the  whole  for  which  we  have  to  care  :  it  is 
but  one  feature  in  the  ideal  character  of  man.  The  monks  may 
have  thought  it  was  all,  or  more  nearly  all  than  it  is  ;  and  there- 
fore their  lives  may  seem  to  us  poor,  mean,  and  emasculate.  .  . 
Henceforth  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  give  our  unmixed  admiration 
to  any  character  which  moral  shadows  overhang.  Henceforth 
we  require  not  greatness  only,  but  goodness  ;  and  not  that  good- 
ness only  which  begins  and  ends  in  conduct  correctly  regulated, 
but  that  love  of  goodness,  that  keen,  pure  feeling  for  it  which 
resides  in  a  conscience  as  sensitive  and  susceptible  as  a  woman's 
modesty." 

In  1847  Mr.  Froude  published  a  volume  of  stories 
nnder  the  title  ''Shadows  of  the  Clouds,"  a  work  of 
which  we  have  seen  no  copy.  Ilis  next  book,  "  The 
Nemesis  of  Faith,"  was  published  in  1819,  and  rendered 


INTRODUCTION.  15 

Mr.  Fronde's  position  at  Oxford  so  unpleasant  that  he 
resigned  his  career  in  the  Church.  Tlie  work  is  a  sort  of 
novel  with  just  enough  of  autobiograjjhj  to  be  a  thorn  in 
the  flesh  of  the  author.  The  story  is  this  :  Sutherland, 
a  young  candidate  for  orders  in  the  Anglican  Church, 
encounters  doubts,  and  then  forms  opinions  which  are 
liostile  to  Christianity  as  taught  at  Oxford.  These 
opinions  he  expresses  in  the  form  of  letters  to  a  friend. 
Pressed  by  liis  family,  he  surrenders  his  new  convictions 
and-  enters  the  priesthood  of  England  ;  but  he  will  preach 
nothing  but  good  behavior  and  sound  character  ;  a  plot 
is  laid  for  him,  and  he  is  revealed  as  a  man  compromis- 
ing between  scepticism  and  religion.  He  surrenders  his 
living  and  wanders  to  Italy.  There  he  seduces  another 
man's  wife,  and  is  rescued  on  the  brink  of  suicide  from 
remorse,  and  falling  into  the  arms  of  the  Roman  creed, 
he  ends  his  d»ys  miserably  in  a  monastery.  The  autobio- 
graphical element  is  in  recollections  of  the  author's  child- 
hood, more  or  less  altered  in  every  case,  and  in  the 
record  of  doubt  and  struggle  through  which  Mr.  Froude 
doubtless  himself  passed.  It  is  easy  to  see,  too,  how  the 
young  author  may  have  considered  the  compromise 
which  Sutherland  makes  and  forecast  its  inevitable 
failure.  But  he  never  entered  upon  the  compromising 
path,  and  all  the  rest  of  the  story  has  no  relation  to  his 
own  life. 

At  this  day  we  may  wonder  how  "  The  Xemesis  of 
Faith"  could  have  been  read  upside  down.  As  the  title 
implies,  Faith  avenged  itself  in  the  story  for  the  dishonor 
put  upon  it  by  Sutherland.  The  man  who  could  not 
believe  in  miracles  or  free  will  suffers  a  paralysis  of  his 
moral  nature,  and  creeps  into  the  home  of  a  friend  to 
desolate  it.  No  more  powerful  vindication  of  Faith  is 
conceivable  than  a  fact  of  this  kind  must  be  ;  a  romance 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

Avitli  sucli  afact  iuits  heart  would  be  assumed,  ordinarily, 
to  have  some  value  as  a  defence  of  Christianity.  But 
the  young  author  had  stated  the  criticism  of  Christianity 
so  forcibly  that  Churchmen  could  not  spare  a  thought 
for  the  moral  of  the  story.  "What  is  stranger  still,  the 
book  has  been  republished  in  this  country  under  circum- 
stances which  indicate  that  the  jjublisher  considered  it  a 
tract  against  the  Christian  religion  and  an  apology  for 
impurity.  This  American  use  of  the  book  leads  one  to 
ask,  quoting  our  author  on  another  subject,  "  Is  human- 
ity crawling  out  of  the  cradle  or  tottering  into  the 
grave  ?  Is  it  in  nursery,  in  school-room,  or  in  open  man- 
hood ?"  If  there  was  little  logic  in  the  Churchmen's 
estimate  of  "  The  Nemesis  of  Faith,' '  there  is  an  assump- 
tion that  readers  are  fools  in  the  estimate  of  the  sceptical 
American  pubhsher  whom  Anthony  Comstock  sent  to  a 
New  York  prison  for  selling  indecent  literature. 

After  his  retirement  from  Oxford,  Mr.  Fronde  betook 
himself  zealously  to  the  study  of  English  history,  which 
liad  been  his  favorite  reading  in  earlier  youth.  The 
greater  part  of  his  literary  work  has  grown  out  of  his  re- 
searches as  a  historian.  Of  his  gi*eat  book,  "  The  History 
of  England  from  the  fall  of  Wolsey  to  the  Defeat  of  the 
Spanish  Armada,"  he  published  the  first  two  volumes  in 
1856,  and  the  last  of  the  twelve  volumes  in  1869. 

"  My  motive  for  selecting  the  Tudor  period,"  Mr.  Froude  wrote 
in  1867,  "  was  the  injustice  which  I  conceived  to  have  been  done 
hy  Lord  Macaulay  and  others  to  the  Fathers  of  the  Eeformed 
English  Church,  to  Cranmer  especially,  the  chief  compiler  of  the 
Liturgy  and  the  author  of  some  of  the  most  beautiful  parts  of  it. 
The  very  point  of  the  first  six  volumes  of  my  history  was  to  show 
what  unfair  treatment  Cranmer,  Latimer,  Hooper,  and  their  com- 
panions in  suffering  had  met  with  from  modern  writers.  If  I  ap- 
peared as  an  apologist  at  all,  it  was  as  the  apologist  of  Cranmer, 
whose    character  I  conceived    to  require  and    deserve  peculiarly 


INTRODUCTION.  17 

delicate  consideration. "  These  sentences  are  a  part  of  the  reply  to 
the  strangely  reckless  accusation  of  Mr.  Freeman,  that  Mr.  Froude 
always  displays  "  a  fanatical  hatred  toward  the  English  Church  at 
all  times  and  under  all  characters." 

The  most  conspicuous  feature  of  the  "  History  of 
England  "  is  the  better  (because  fuller)  light  in  which  it 
places  King  Henry  the  Eighth.  This  sovereign  and  his 
nurperous  marriages  had  for  two  centuries  been  the 
theme  of  general  reprobation.  Charles  Dickens  wrote 
the-  general  verdict  when  he  described  Henry  (in  the 
", Child's  History  of  England  ")  as  "  a  great  blot  of  blood 
and  grease  on  the  history  of  England."  Such  verdicts 
are  easy,  and  satisfy  a  moral  craving.  We  all  know  that 
there  is  a  vast  amount  of  evil  in  the  world,  and  we  like 
to  get  it  concentrated  in  the  career  of  some  great  scoun- 
drel whom  we  can  lash  through  the  world.  A  man  who 
})uts  a  stop  to  this  easy  system  of  poetical  justice,  by 
showing  us  that  we  are  wrapping  the  wrong  man,  is  not 
ajjt  to  be  enthusiastically  welcomed.  Mr.  Froude  found 
a  great  body  of  public  documents  to  which  preceding 
historians  had  given  no  attention.  He  studied  them,  and 
obtained  in  them  a  new  view  of  Henry  the  Eighth. 
That  new  view  colors  and  characterizes  his  History. 
Henry,  in  the  light  of  the  documents,  is  not  so  bad  a  man 
as  we  thought  him  ;  j^erhaps  Mr.  Froude  makes  him  a 
better  man  than  he  was  ;  reactions  are  apt  to  react  too 
far.  But  as  a  work  of  research,  as  a  new  judgment  pro- 
nounced upon  many  characters  of  its  period,  and  as  a 
model  of  historical  style,  the  "History  of  England" 
deserves  and  will  keep  its  large  place  in  the  esteem  of 
the  English-reading  public. 

In  1872-74  Mr.  Froude  published  his  work  on  "  The 
English  in  Ireland  in  the  Eighteenth  Century."  The 
criticism  of  this  work  has  been  even  more  fierce  than  that 


18  INTRODUCTION". 

which  pursued  the  "History  of  England."  Of  both 
works  Mr.  Froude's  defence  is  the  same.  He  has  built 
upon  documents  of  a  public  or  otherwise  presumptively 
authoritative  nature  ;  but  in  the  treatment  of  the  Irish 
he  is  at  the  immense  disadvantage  of  being  an  English- 
man, and  stumbles  into  a  pitfall  which  is  called  "  race." 
He  has  pronounced  some  judgments  respecting  the  Irish 
Celts  which  are  certainly  too  sweeping,  and  confound 
the  innocent  with  the  guilty.  "  Race"  is  a  fiction  of 
anthropologists,  in  so  far  as  it  assumes  that  men  perform 
either  good  or  bad  actions  because  they  belong  to  a  partic- 
ular tribe,  or  because  their  ancestors  did.  No  one  likes 
to  have  his  ancestors  universally  described  in  terms  that 
(so  far  as  history  can  know)  accurately  describe  only 
some  individuals  of  his  country. 

Our  fellow-citizens  of  Irish  race  have,  not  without 
some  reason,  a  strong  prejudice  against  Mr.  Froude,  but 
they  ought  not  to  overlook  the  fact  that  he  has  very 
vigorously  described  the  misgovernment  of  Ireland  by 
England  in  the  very  book  which  has  provoked  their 
wrath.  The  present  volume  contains  a  selection  from 
that  work  which  gives  an  example  of  the  English  mis- 
takes in  Ireland,  and  at  the  same  time  illustrates  the 
notions  of  economic  science  which  prevailed  two  hundred 
years  ago.* 

Our  author  has  been  for  forty  years  a  popular  con- 
tributor to  the  English  periodicals  ;  and  it  is  in  these  less 
ambitious  essays  and  sketches  that  his  writings  have 
travelled  round  the  globe.  Our  busy  time  wants  to  do 
its  hard  reading  rapidly  ;  to  have  opinions  stated  in  the 
most  condensed  form  that  is  consistent  with  rapid  read- 
ing. Mr.  Froude  excels  in  pithy,  clear,  and  vivacious 
statement.     He  is  not  in  any  doubt  what  he  thinks  ;  he 

*  See  "  Seventeenth  Century  Political  Economy." 


INTKODUCTIOX.  19 

has  no  hesitation  in  his  temper  ;  he  writes  in  the  swift 
and  attractive  waj  which  the  busj  world  tinds  good.  In 
1867  he  made  a  beginning  of  collecting  his  periodical 
work  into  volumes,  which  he  calls  "  Short  Studies  on 
Great  Subjects."  In  the  American  edition  there  are  now 
four  of  these  volumes  ;  and  in  the  preface  to  the  fourth 
the  author  tells  us  that  it  is  the  last  of  the  series. 
-/■jOther  works  of  Mr.  Froude  remain  to  be  noticed. 
"  Caesar,  a  Sketch,"  is  an  outline  of  the  career  of  Julius 
Csesar.  Mr.  Froude  has  abundance  of  good  company  in 
his- high  estimate  of  the  character,  purposes,  and  useful- 
ness of  the  founder  of  the  Koman  Empire.  Research 
has  rehabilitated  the  memory  of  Caesar  with  a  reverent 
affection  which  the  "  sketch"  of  Mr.  Froude  represents 
m/English  literature.  The  other  great  languages  have 
many  works  of  the  same  character.  Mr.  Froude  has  also 
outlined  the'^life  and  character  of  John  Bun^'^an,  in  a 
volume  belonging  to  the  series  of  "  English  Men  of 
Letters."  It  is  a  proof  cf  breadth  of  judgment  and 
sympathy,  that  Mr.  Froude  likes  both  Caesar  and  Bun- 
yan.  Their  manliness  and  force  of  character  belong  to 
a  common  ground  which  our  author  loves  to  feel  under 
his  feet.  He  believes  in  great  good  men  ;  there  is  this 
difference  between  him  and  Thomas  Carlyle,  that  the 
latter's  great  men  seem  to  most  of  us  to  be  unconscion- 
able scoundrels. 

It  remains  to  speak  brieily  of  Mr.  Froude  as  the  biog- 
rapher of  Carlyle,  a  work  which  he  still  has  in  hand. 
Our  readers  are  familiar  with  the  "  Reminiscences," 
"  The  Letters  of  Jane  Welsh  Carlyle,"  and  "  The  First 
Forty  Years"  of  the  rugged  Northern  bear  ;  and  they 
also  know  that  Mr.  Froude  raised  a  storm  which  might 
be  described  as  a  "  blizzard  "  when  he  published  the 
"  Reminiscences."     He  probably  did  the  best  and  wis«:^t 


20  INTRODUCTION. 

thing  in  giving  to  the  world  just  what  Thomas  Carlyle 
had  thought  fit  to  write  about  himself  and  it  in  his  auto- 
biograpliical  notes.  The  worid  wants  to  know  what 
kind  of  a  human  creature  a  great  author  really  was  ;  it 
will  never  be  satisfied  until  it  finds  out  ;  and  such  a  mail 
as  Carlyle  it  will  certainly  find  out  to  the  last  and  least 
of  his  frailties.  Mr.  Froude  did  Carlyle's  memory  a 
service  by  emptying  at  once,  before  any  time  had  been 
spent  in  controversies,  the  contents  of  these  diaries  and 
note-books  into  literary  highways.  We  found  out  at  once 
all  Carlyle's  faults  and  frailties,  and  the  subject  has 
already  ceased  to  have  much  interest.  Mr.  Froude,  if 
he  had  been  a  small  man,  might  have  dribbled  these 
matters  out  carefully  and  dramatically — and  amassed  a 
fortune  bv  economizing  "  the  remains"  of  Thomas 
Carlyle. 

HIS    OPINIONS. 

Mr.  Froude  b<  lon^  s  to  the  practical  school  of  philoso- 
phers. He  recc  gniz  ^s  that  some  provisional  disposition 
lias  to  be  made  c  I  the  questions  about  nature,  mind,  will, 
and  conscience,  whicl .  thinkers  and  dialecticians  have 
wrestled  with  ir  all  ag  3S.  The  practical  solution  is  that 
such  questions  a  'e  bey*  nd  human  powers.  In  his  article 
on  Spinoza  he  disposi  s  of  that  acute  and  courageous 
philosopher's  m<  I'als  of  pantheism  with  such  sentences  as 
this  :  "  We  are  firmly  i  onvinced  that  of  these  questions, 
and  of  all  like  tl  lem,  pn  ctical  answers  only  lie  within  the 
reach  of  human  faculties ,  and  that  in  researches  into  the 
absolute  we  are  )n  the  r  )ad  which  ends  nowhere."  In 
the  same  essay  writing ;  of  the  boldness  with  which 
Spinoza  makes  God  the  author  of  all  evil,  Mr.  Froude 
says  :  "  We  bel  eve  for  (  urselves  that  logic  has  no  busi- 
ness with  such  questions  ;  that  the  answer  to  them  lies  in 


INTRODUCTION.  21 

the  conscience,  and  not  in  the  intellect.'"  One  of 
Spinoza's  answers  to  objections  is  this  :  "  When  a  man 
does  this  or  that,  God  does  it,  but  God  does  it  not  as  he 
is  Infinite,  hut  as  he  is  expressed  in  that  man^s  nature.'''' 
To  which  Mr.  Froude  replies,  speaking  for  Englishmen 
of  his  time  : 

"  "  It  is  not  so— we  know  it,  and  that  is  enough.  We  are  well 
_:a^are  of  the  phalanx  of  difficulties  that  lie  about  our  theistic  con- 
ceptions. They  are  -quite  enough,  if  religion  depended  on  specu- 
lative consistency  and  not  in  obedience  of  life,  to  perplex  and 
teijify  us.  .  .  We  do  not  care  to  have  these  questions  answered 
at  all.  Conscience  is  the  single  tribunal  to  which  we  choose  to  be 
referred,  and  conscience  declares  imperatively  that  what  he 
[Spinoza]  says  is  not  true." 

*' ■  ^KX  the  end  of  the  critique  of  Spinoza,  Mr.  Froude 
points  out  the  practical  modifications  of  freedom  of 
choice.  "  Pi'aetically  we  are  forced  to  regard  each  other 
as  not  free,  and  to  make  allowance,  every  moment,  for 
influences  for  which  we  cannot  hold  each  other  responsi- 
ble. .  .  Duties  which  are  easy  to  one,  another  finds  im- 
possible. .  .  These  and  other  considerations  considerably 
modify  the  popular  view  of  the  freedom  of  the  human 
will. "  But  Mr.  Froude  is  too  vigorous  a  moralist  to  stop 
here.  Whether  or  not  we  can  do  one  thing  and  refrain 
from  another,  "  we  have  a  consciousness  that  we  ought 
to  choose  l)etween  them,  a  sense  of  duty,  as  Aristotle 
expresses  it,  which  we  cannot  shake  ofl^.  This  fact 
involves  some  measure  of  freedom,  or  it  is  nonsense.  .  . 
Somewhere  or  other  tlie  influence  of  causes  ceases  to 
operate,"  leaving  men  with  a  measure  of  self-determina- 
tion, "  by  the  amount  of  which,  and  not  by  their  specific 
actions,  moral  merit  or  demerit  is  to  be  measured.  .  . 
We  refuse  to  allow  men  to  be  considered  all  equally  guilty 
for  the  same  faults  :  and  we  insist  that  there  is  some- 


22  INTRODUCTION. 

where  a  point  oi  freedom.  Where  that  point  is — where 
other  influences  terminate  and  responsibihty  begins — will 
always  be  of  intricate  and  often  impossible  solution.  But 
if  there  be  such  a  point  at  all,  it  is  fatal  to  necessitarian- 
ism, and  man  is  what  he  has  been  hitherto  supposed  to  be 
— an  exception  in  the  order  of  nature,  with  a  power  not 
differing  in  degree,  but  differing  in  kind,  from  those  of 
other  creatures." 

In  his  "  Plea  for  the  Free  Discussion  of  Theological 
Difficulties,"  first  pubhshed  in  1863,  Mr,  Froude  makes 
a  beautiful  and  eloquent  plea  for  Christian  character  in  a 
few  warm  and  bright  sentences  : 

"  The  creed  of  eighteen  centuries,"  he  says,  "  is  not  about  to 
fade  away  like  an  exhalation,  nor  are  the  new  lights  of  science  so 
exhilarating  that  serious  persons  can  look  with  comfort  to  ex- 
changing one  for  the  other.  Christianity  has  abler  advocates 
than  its  professed  defenders,  in  those  many  quiet  and  humble  men 
and  women  who  in  the  light  of  it  and  tlie  strength  of  it  live  holy, 
beautiful,  and  self-denying  lives.  The  God  that  answers  by  fire  is 
the  God  whom  mankind  will  acknowledge  ;  and  so  long  as  the 
fruits  of  the  Spirit  continue  to  be  visible  in  charity,  in  self-sacri- 
fice, in  those  graces  which  raise  human  creatures  above  them- 
selves, and  invest  them  with  that  beauty  of  holiness  which  only 
religion  confers,  thoughtful  persons  will  remain  convinced  that 
with  them  in  some  form  or  other  is  the  secret  of  truth.  .  .  When 
a  particular  belief  is  fruitful  in  nobleness  of  character,  we  need 
trouble  ourselves  very  little  with  scientific  demonstrations  that  it 
is  false." 

And  yet  Mr.  Froude  has,  in  the  same  article  and  in 
others,  stated  with  great  strength  the  intellectual  and 
scientific  difficulties  of  religion  in  our  time.  But  he  is 
always  serious  and  reverent  in  his  language.  In  the  essay 
on  "  Criticism  of  the  Gospel  History,"  he  refers  to  the 
two  habits  of  thought  which  may  be  traced  throughout 
history — "  one  giving  us  churches  and  the  knowledge  of 


INTRODUCTION.  23 

God,  the  otlier  giving  us  freedom  and  science'''- — and 
reminds  tis  that  eacli  regards  the  other  as  its  natural 
enemy,  lie  also  sees  that  human  society  is  perpetually 
passing  from  tlie  dominion  of  one  to  that  of  the  other  of 
these  mental  conditions,  and  asks  : 

"  Is  this  antagonism  a  law  of  humanity  ?  As  mankind  move 
'upward  throvigh  the  ascending  circles  of  progress,  is  it  forever 
(^ijB  be  with  them  as  with  the  globe  which  they  inhabit — of  which 
one  hemisphere  is  perpetually  dark  ?  Have  the  lessons  of  the 
Reformation  1>een  thrown  away  ?  Is  knowledge  alvrays  to 
advance  under  tlio  ban  of  religion?  Is  faith  never  to  cease  to 
dread  investigation  ?  Is  science  chiefly  to  value  each  new  discov- 
ery as  a  victory  gained  over  its  rival  ?  Is  the  spiritunl  world  to 
revolve  eternally  upon  an  axis  of  which  the  two  poles  are  Mate- 
rialism and  Superstition,  to  l)e  buried  in  their  alternate  occulta- 
t^ons  in  periods  of  utter  darkness,  or  lifted  into  an  icy  light  where 
there  is  neither  life  nor  warmth  ?" 

This  passage  clearly  displays  tlie  spirit  in  which  Mr. 
Froude  doubts  —his  profound  faith  in  religion  as  ex- 
pi'essed  in  Christian  teaching  respecting  duty,  and  his 
doubt  whether  Christian  doctrine  can  ever  free  itself 
from  the  hostility  of  the  free  scientiiic  spirit.  Mr.  Froude 
belongs  in  both  camps.  He  has  a  herculean  grasp  on 
faith  in  that  lovely  type  of  human  character  which  has 
been  bred  in  the  English  race  under  Christian  teaching  ; 
he  holds  as  tenaciously  with  those  who  demand  satis- 
factory reasons  for  accepting  the  Christian  creed.  Per- 
luips  he  nuiy  be  fairly  described  as  a  believer  who  is 
reverently  fond  of  the  fruits  of  faith,  but  much  dissatis- 
fied with  all  and  singular  the  dogmatic  statements  of 
Christianity.  Certain  truths  of  historical  Christianity 
were  put  into  a  brilliant  focus  for  him  in  the  Tractarian 
controversy.  Young  Froude  had  to  settle  for  himself 
whether  Protestantism  had  a  sound  intellectual  basis,  or 


24  IXTRODUCTIOK. 

ratlicr,  lie  liad  to  dispose  of,  once  for  all,  the  Catholic 
theory  that  Providence  had  made  the  Church  a  living 
and  visible  authority  that  could  not  err.  lie  rejected 
that  theory  in  the  very  lire.  Then  it  followed  that  all 
men  could  make  mistakes,  that  nohody  on  earth  is  ex- 
empt from  a  liability  to  error.  This  pair  of  conclusions 
came  to  him  in  the  midst  of  experiences  which  revealed 
their  vast  consequences  :  nothing  is  true  because  the 
Church  teaches  it,  or  has  inherited  it,  or  has  never  doubted 
it,  or  makes  a  foundation  stone  of  it.  In  the  Reformation, 
Protestantism  appealed  to  the  Cfesar  of  Reason  ;  but 
to  Mr.  Froude  Protestantism  seems  to  be  possessed  by 
an  invincible  reluctance  to  appear  before  the  judge  to 
whose  bar  it  once  dragged  Catholicism  for  condemnation. 
It  is  easy  to  detect  in  his  religious  criticism  a  doubt 
whether  Protestantism  as  a  system  of  doctrine  can  endure 
the  tierce  light  of  Reason  ;  but  for  him  the  alternative 
would  be  neither  Catholic  infallibility  nor  materialism,  but 
the  "eternal  religion  of  man's  heart  and  conscience," 
•whether  supported  or  unsupported  by  objective  realities. 
In  his  essay  on  "  The  Times  of  Erasmus  and  Luther," 
he  makes  a  still  clearer  statement  of  his  religious  views  : 
"  I  do  not  myself  consider  that  the  formulas  in  which 
men  express  their  belief  are  of  much  consequence.  The 
question  is  rather  of  the  thing  expressed  ;  and  so  long  as 
we  find  a  living  consciousness  that  above  the  w^orld  and 
above  human  life  there  is  a  righteous  God,  who  will  jndge 
men  according  to  their  works,  whether  they  say  their 
prayers  in  Latin  or  English,  whether  they  call  themselves 
Protestants  or  call  themselves  Catholics,  appears  to  me  of 
quite  secondary  importance." 

All  Mr.  Fronde's  theological  oj)inions  he  w^ould  prob- 
ably regard  as  of  very  small  consequence.     He  intimates 


INTRODUCTION".  25 

in  many  places  that  he  does  not  value  his  own  religious 
thinking  very  highly — not  any  more  highly  than  he 
values  that  of  other  people.  But  there  is  one  order  of 
ideas  and  their  forms  of  expression  which  he  profoundly 
reverences.  He  perceives  that  mankind  have  climbed  to 
their  highest  ideal  of  goodness  under  Christianity  ;  and 
he  holds  this  ideal  as  the  one  perfect  fruit  of  all  human 
progress.  Ask  him  to  define  the  good  man  and  he  will 
describe  a  character  which  is  self-forgetful  and  unselfish, 
which  renounces  pleasure,  gain,  indulgence,  and  all  other 
personal  advantages  remote  or  present,  in  order  to  do 
nght.  "  The  essence  of  true  nobility  is  neglect  of  self. 
Let  the  thought  of  self  pass  in,  and  the  beauty  of  a  great 
action  is  gone,  like  the  bloom  from  a  soiled  flower."  In 
character  and  conduct  he  finds  a  region  of  certainties  bor- 
dering a  land  of  shadows,  and  he  does  not  expect  the 
shadows  to  pass.  However  long  man  may  live  on  the 
earth,  "  the  riddle  of  man's  nature  will  never  be  ex- 
plained. There  will  be  that  in  him  yet  which  physical 
laws  will  fail  to  explain,  that  something,  whatever  it  be, 
in  himself,  and  in  the  world,  which  science  cannot  fathom, 
and  which  suggests  the  unknown  possibilities  of  his  origin 
and  destiny." 

The  practical  bent  of  Mr.  Froude's  thinking  is  mani- 
fest throughout  the  essay  on  "  The  Oxford  Counter- 
Kef  ormation."  This  topic  was  for  him  a  perpetual 
temptation  to  autobiography.  He  suffered  in  the  fires 
of  that  controversy.  But  he  writes  of  it  in  a  temper 
which  posterity  will  doubtless  find  calm  if  not  impartial. 
Lookinir  back,  he  sees  the  naturalistic  and  the  Catholic 
movements  starting  at  the  same  time,  near  the  same  spot, 
and  marching  off  in  opposite  directions.  While  two 
groups  of  men  of  the  same  general  education  assailed  one 


2C)  INTTllODUCTION. 

tlie  foundations  of  Protestantism,  and  the  other  those  of 
Christianity  itself,  Mr.  Froude  watches  their  conflicts, 
and  has  no  sympathy  with  either. 

"  For  myself,"  he  writes,  "  I  ata  convinced  that  they  are  roads 
both  of  them  which  lead  to  the  wrong  place,  and  that  it  is  better 
for  us  to  occupy  ourselves  with  realities  than  fret  our  minds 
about  illusions.  If  the  Church  of  Rome  recovers  power  eaough 
to  be  dangerous,  it  will  be  shattered  upon  the  same  rocks  on 
which  it  was  dashed  three  centuries  ago.  .  .  In  matters  of  relig- 
ion, science  can  say  nothing,  for  it  knows  nothing.  .  .  So  far  as 
philosophy  can  see,  there  may  be  nothing  in  the  materials  of 
Christianity  which  is  necessarily  and  certainly  supernatural. 
And  yet  Christianity  exists,  and  has  existed,  and  has  been  the 
most  powerful  spiritual  force  which  has  ever  been  felt  among 
mankind." 

The  essay  from  which  these  sentences  are  taken  was 
originally  published  in  1881  in  Good  Woy^ds  ;  they  doubt- 
less express  the  mature  convdctions  of  their  author. 

As  a  historical  writer,  Mr.  Froude  has  always  in  view 
the  times  for  which  he  writes  as  well  as  those  about 
which  he  writes,  and  this  reference  to  the  uses  of  the 
historical  knowledge  which  he  is  imparting  is  openly 
and  frankly  made.  There  is  an  affectation  in  one  school 
of  historians  of  placing  all  events  and  opinions  in  the  at- 
mosphere where  they  flourished  ;  but  it  is  an  affectation 
only,  and  misleads  the  reader  who  trusts  its  fair  promises. 
No  man  of  this  age  can  reproduce  the  atmosphere  that  sur- 
rounded the  life  of  Thomas  Becket  ;  a  modern  education 
compels  us  to  see  with  modern  eyes  and  feel  with  modem 
hearts.  Only  the  old  historians  can  give  us  the  old  his- 
tories. No  man  living  in  the  age  which  Motley  describes 
in  his  "  Rise  of  the  Dutch  Republic"  could  have  written 
a  book  producing  in  us  the  emotions  and  reflections  which 
Motley  inspires.     A  historian  is  a  man  of  like  passions 


IKTRODFCTION.  27 

with  ourselves,  and  Las  a  personal  equation  to  be  con- 
sidered in  estimating  the  things  which  we  know  by  the 
aid  of  his  telescope.  Mr.  Fronde's  frankness,  his  very 
veliemence,  saves  us  from  becoming  the  victims  of  mis- 
leading antipathies.  We  know  that  he  is  a  vigorous 
Protestant  when  he  is  writing  of  Roman  Catholicism.  We 
know  that  he  has  no  special  affection  for  the  ideas  which 
are  described  under  the  term  Anglicanism  ;  and  Ave  know 
that  he  has"  no  thoroughgoing  symj)atliy  for  the  Irish 
Cejts,  and  always  expresses  his  admiration  for  them 
witli  strong  qualifications. 

We  cannot  think  of  a  man  as  an  unbeliever  who 
writes  : 

"  Churches  exist  in  this  world  to  remind  us  of  the  eternal  laws 
> 

wbich  we  are  bound  to  obej'  ;"  nor  can  we  be  hasty  in  condemn- 
ing him  when  he  adds,  "  unfortunately,  they  have  preferred  in 
later  times  the*6peculative  side  of  things  to  the  practical.  They 
take  up  into  their  teaching  opinions  and  teachings  which  are 
merely  ephemeral  ;  which  would  naturally  die  out  with  the  prog- 
ress of  knowledge  ;  but  having  received  a  spurious  sanctity  pro- 
long their  days  unreasonably,  and  become  first  immeaning,  and 
then  occasions  of  superstition.  .  .  While  the  meaning  is  alive  in 
them  [all  forms  of  belief,  or  ceremony]  they  are  uot  only  harm- 
less, but  pregnant  and  life-giving  ;  when  their  virtue  departs 
they  hide  God  from  us,  and  make  us  practically  into  atheists." 

We  suppose  that  Roman  Catholics  think  of  Mr.  Froude 
as  a  sworn  enemy.  But  he  has  written  of  parts  of  their 
Church  history  with  most  enthusiastic  praise.     He  says  : 

"  Never  in  all  their  history,  in  ancient  timi-s  or  modern,  never 
that  we  know  of.  have  mankind  thrown  out  of  themselves  anything 
so  grand,  so  beautiful,  so  useful  as  tlie  Catholic  Church  once 
was.  .  .  At  the  time  I  speak  of  the  Churcli  ruled  the  state  with 
the  authority  of  a  conscience  ;  and  self-interest  as  a  motive  of 
action  was  only  named  to  be  abhorred.  The  bishops  and  clergy 
were  regarded  freely  and  simply  as  the  immediate  ministers  of  the 


28  INTRODUCTION. 

Almighty,  and  they  seem  to  liave  really  deserved  that  high  esti- 
mate of  their  character.  It  was  not  for  the  doctrines  they  taught 
only,  or  chiefly,  that  they  were  held  in  honor.  Brave  men  do  not 
fall  down  before  their  fellow-mortals  for  the  words  which  they 
speak  or  for  the  rites  which  they  perform.  Wisdom,  justice, 
self-denial,  nobleness,  purity,  high-mindedness — these  are  the 
qualities  before  which  the  free-born  races  of  Europe  have  been 
contented  to  bow  ;  and  in  no  order  of  men  were  such  qualities  to 
be  found  as  they  were  found  six  hundred  years  ago  in  the  clergy 
of  the  Catholic  Church."  This  clergy  "  sheltered  the  weak  from 
the  strong,  put  the  serf  and  his  lord  on  a  common  level  of  sin- 
fulness, and  rose  from  among  the  people  to  the  mitre  and  the 
triple  crown,  just  as  nowadays  the  rail-splitter  and  the  tailor 
become  Presidents  of  the  Republic  of  the  West."* 

It  is  easy  enough  for  a  broad-minded  man  to  believe 
all  that,  and  also  to  perceive  that  the  power  of  the 
priesthood  over  human  life  exposed  its  members  to  cor- 
ruption. Mr.  Froude  also  says  :  "  But  times  change,  and 
good  things  as  well  as  bad  grow  old  and  have  to  die.  The 
heart  of  the  matter  which  the  Catholic  Church  had 
taught  was  the  fear  of  God  ;  but  the  language  of  it  and 
the  formulas  of  it  were  made  up  of  human  ideas  and 
notions  about  things  which  the  mere  increase  of  human 
knowledge  gradually  made  incredible."  As  faith  died, 
corruption  set  in.  For  a  time  men  endure  corruption 
rather  than  encounter  anarchy.  As  corruption  advances, 
they  prepare  for  revolt.  Tlie  revolution  may  be  long 
delayed  : 

"But  it  is  with  human  things  as  it  is  with  the  great  icebergs 
which  drift  southward  out  of  the  frozen  seas.  They  swim  two 
thirds  under  water  and  one  third  above  ;  and  so  long  as  the  equi- 
librium is  sustained,  you  would  think  they  were  as  stable  as  the 

*  "  Times  of  Erasmus  and  Luther  ;"  Lectures  delivered  at  New 
Castle,  1867. 


IXTKODUCTIOX.  20 

rocks.  But  the  sea-water  is  warmer  than  the  air.  Hundreds  of 
fathoms  down,  the  tepid  current  washes  the  base  of  the  berg  •, 
silently  in  those  far  deeps  the  center  of  gravity  is  changed  ;  and 
then,  in  a  moment,  with  one  vast  roll,  the  enormous  mass  heaves 
over,  and  the  crystal  peaks  which  had  been  glancing  so  proudly 
in  the  sunlight  are  buried  in  the  ocean  forever." 

"^'The  space  allotted  to  this  introduction  is  not  laro^e 
ene^gli  for  a  full  review  of  Mr.  Fronde's  opinions.  We 
Lave  touched  lightly  upon  some  leading  ideas  that  appear 
in  li.is  books.  One  thing  deserves  mention.  Since  he  got 
upon  his  feet  after  the  Oxford  hurricane,  he  has  been 
singularly  consistent  with  himself.  Many  of  us  spend 
our  lives  without  finding  a  solid  footing.  Mr.  Fronde  had 
found  his  in  his  thirty-second  year,  and  his  is  still  standing 
where  he  planted  himself  in  1850.  His  Agnosticism  is 
that  of  a  keen-eyed  man,  who  perceives  the  near  and  in- 
vincible barriei's  of  research  into  the  mysteries  of  Being. 
Ilis  faith  is  an  unshaken  confidence  in  the  duty  and 
beauty  of  right  living,  lie  believes  that  great  human 
enthusiasms  (such  as  asceticism)  have  noble  meanings. 
He  cleaves  to  Christianity  as  the  purest  and  most  purify- 
ing faith  which  the  world  has  known. 

niS    CONTROVERSIES. 

Mr.  Froiule  has  always  been  a  traveller  studying  living 
men  with  his  eyes,  as  well  as  dead  men  with  a  historical 
telescope.  He  has  made  a  lecturing  tour  among  our- 
selves ;  he  has  twice  visited  South  Africa  ;  he  studied 
the  Irish  of  to-day  during  a  residence  in  Kerry  for 
several  summers  ;  and  one  of  the  most  delightful  papers 
in  this  collection  is  a  sketch  of  recent  travels  in  Norway. 
The  subject  of  his  lectures  in  this  country  was  ill-chosen. 
We  are  not  altogether  absorbed  in  the  Irish  cpiestion, 
and  that  question  is  no  more  likely  to  be  settled  by  histori- 


80  INTRODUCTION. 

cal  evidence,  than  the  qnestion  of  miracles  is  likely  to 
be  disposed  of  by  testimony  alone.  But  Mr,  Fronde's 
visit  strengrthened  the  affection  which  he  cherishes  for 
Americans  and  which  Americans  cherish  for  him.  His 
lectures  among  us  drew  him  into  a  controversy  with 
Father  Burke,  in  which  the  historian  received  some  hard 
blows  ;  but  in  controversy,  as  it  is  ordinarily  conducted 
among  Christians,  he  requires  no  help  or  sympathy  ;  he 
is  able  to  take  care  of  himself.  There  is,  however,  one 
point  in  the  attacks  on  Mr.  Froude,  from  the  sting  of 
which  he  is  entitled  to  such  relief  as  the  respect  of 
candid  men  can  give.  We  have  found  pencilled  over  his 
volumes  on  Ireland,  which  iire  in  use  at  our  public 
libraries,  gross  charges  that  Mr.  Froude  is  dishonest. 
Some  of  these  are  below  notice  except  as  facts.  When, 
for  example,  one  reader  effervesces  in  a  pencil  note  which 
tells  us  that  "  Froude  is  the  son  of  a  hick''''  (we  preserve 
the  spelhng),  the  commentary  is  not  worth  noting  except 
as  a  proof  of  feeling  in  the  commentator.  But  charges 
that  "  Froude  is  untrustworthy  and  dishonest"  are 
serious,  and  they  are  the  more  serious  that  Mr.  Edward 
A.  Freeman,  the  historian,  has  made  them  with  still 
greater  vehemence  than  the  pencil-marking  critics  who 
deface  books  in  the  libraries.  Mr.  Freeman's  charges 
include  those  of  the  scribblers  ;  we  will  first  notice  the 
learned  and  accomplished  critic's  animadversions.  In 
1878  Mr.  Freeman  devoted  ninety-eight  pages  in  the 
Contempora7'y  Review  to  demolishing  Mr.  Froude  as  a 
historian  and  as  a  man.  lie  fixed  upon  his  victim  the 
guilt  of  one  mistake,  two  typographical  errors,  and  three 
or  four  sins  of  strong  language.  He  described  Mr. 
Froude  as  dishonest  and  careless  of  truth,  and  as  in- 
capable of  stating  anything  as  he  finds  it  in  a  document 
before  him.     No  proofs  are  furnished  to  sustain  these 


IKTKODUCTION".  31 

grave  charges.  The  criticism  is  a  piece  of  bitter  in- 
vective. It  accuses  Mr.  Froude  of  ignoring  the  work  of 
his  brotlier  Richard  Hurrell  Froude  from  base  motives, 
and  "  dealing  stabs  in  the  dark  at  a  brotlier's  ahnost  for- 
gotten fame."  The  foundation  for  this  charge  is  simply 
the  omission  by  Mr.  Froude  of  any  reference  to  the  fact 
that  his  dead  brother  had  written  a  life  of  Thomas 
,Becket.  We  have  wondered,  on  this  side  of  the  water, 
wliat  Mr.  Froude  had  done  to  Mr.  Freeman  to  provoke 
siieli  an  unmanly  attack.  Mr.  Froude  has,  in  two  of  his 
^essays,  spoken  in  the  strongest  terms  of  his  brother's 
genius  and  power.  He  has  never  stabbed  that  brother's 
fame,  so  far  as  we  Americans  can  discover.  The  two 
ehareres  of  Mr.  Freeman  that  stick  are  that  Mr.  Froude  is 
"^capable  of  mistake,  and  that  he  is  sometimes  too  vehe- 
ment. Both  accusations  lie  against  every  writer  of 
ability  ;  an(>-  in  his  criticism  of  Mr.  Froude,  Mr.  Free- 
man himself  has  earned  a  degree  as  a  master  in  the  arts  of 
beinij  mistaken  and  of  inaccurate  vehemence.  So  far  as 
Mr.  Fronde's  Irish  critics  are  concerned,  the  controversy 
is  mainly  respecting  the  value  of  certain  bodies  of  testi- 
mony. For  ourselves,  we  have  not  much  confidence  in 
either  set  of  documents  or  witnesses.  There  is  some- 
thing in  the  air  of  Ireland  that  tolerates  nothing  but  sub- 
jective trutli  within  a  hundred  leagues  of  its  green 
shores,  and  makes  every  ohjectivefact  reflect  at  least  two 
totally  different  shapes.  At  all  events,  we  should  have 
to  assume  some  such  power  to  exist  in  the  sweet  Irish  air 
before  we  could  bcffin  to  harmonize  the  diverse  and 
mntually  Ijclligerent  accounts  of  the  facts  of  Irish  history 
under  English  rule.  Bnt  candid  men  cannot  doubt  that, 
whether  he  be  right  or  wrong,  Mr.  Froude  is  an  honest 
man  and  a  faithful  historian — faithful  t<»  tlic  liglits  by 
which  he  is  guided. 


3-^  INTIIODUCTION. 


JIIS   STYLE. 


Mr.  Froude  is  among  tlie  best  masters,  living  or  dead, 
of  the  art  of  writing  the  English  language.  His  sen- 
tences are  always  clean,  jDlain,  and  complete  ;  there  is  no 
slovenliness,  no  obscurity,  and  no  deficiency.  The  reader 
is  saved  all  unnecessary  effort,  and  has  no  need  to  go  back 
and  disentangle  the  thread  of  the  thought  in  some  ill- 
adjusted  qualifying  clause.  He  illustrates  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer's  principle  of  style  by  "  economizing  the  atten- 
tion of  the  reader."  Flowing,  perspicuous,  and  abun- 
dant as  Mr.  Fronde's  style  is,  it  seldom  attracts  attention 
to  itself.  Probably  most  of  his  readers  peruse  his  works 
without  any  feeling  that  they  are  those  of  a  finished 
master  of  the  art  of  writing.  But  a  style  which  had  only 
the  qualities  we  have  named  would  fall  short  of  the  best. 
Smooth  and  clear  statement  is  of  inestimable  value  ;  but 
in  the  best  literature  there  are  higher  qualities.  To  keep 
the  homely  graces  of  clearness  and  fulness,  and  to  add 
to  them  sympathetic  warmth  and  Imninous  exaltation,  so 
that  the  reader  is  lifted  and  carried  as  though  a  livinsr 
voice  and  presence  had  caj^tured  him — that  is  the  per- 
fection of  the  art  of  writing.  But  we  appreciate  recrea- 
tion best  when  we  get  it  in  moderation  ;  and  a  writer 
who  is  always  on  the  heights,  as  Macaulay  is  wont  to  be, 
wearies  us  with  a  monotonous  strain  of  exaltation.  Mr. 
Froude  keeps  the  plain  road  for  the  most  part,  but  makes 
his  excursions  to  the  hills  often  enough  to  nourish  an  ex- 
pectation of  these  journeys,  but  not  often  enougli  to 
make  them  wearisome.  There  is  in  his  works  no  attempt 
at  fine  writing,  no  sustained  and  brilliant  periods  pursuing 
each  other  over  a  whole  page.  When  we  quote  him, 
we  must  quote  him  for  his  thought  as  well  as  for  his 
style.     Some  exceptions  to  this  rule  are  found,  however, 


INTRODUCTION.  33 

in  his  earlier  books— books  whicli  he  has  dropped  as  the 
unripe  harvest  of  his  boyhood.  And  yet  "  The  Nemesis 
of  Faith"  shows  all  the  good  qiiahties  of  Mr.  Fronde's 
style,  though  it  has  the  faults  which  one  expects  in  a 
great  man  at  thirty.  He  could  not  produce  to-day  better 
sentences  than  the  following,  taken  from  that  boyish 
"book  : 

'"''*'  The  roads  they  have  to  travel  are  beatea  in  by  the  unscrupu- 
lous as  well  as  the  scrupulous  ;  they  are  none  of  the  cleanest,  and 
tbie"  race  is  too  fast  to  give  one  time  to  pick  one's  way." 

''  "  It  is  night  and  day  (or  it  ought  to  be)  with  all  of  us,  if  we 
■want  to  keep  in  health.  To  be  sure,  now  and  then  there  will 
come  a  North  Pole  winter  with  its  six  months'  frost  and  darkness 
and  mock  suns  ;  but  Nature  is  still  fair  and  pays  them  off  with 
th^r  six  months  of  day." 

"  The  doctrinal  food  the  Church  had  to  offer  to  men  of  stamp 
like  that  was  tJ'ut  like  watered  chaff  for  the  giant  dray-horse  of 
the  coal-yard." 

"  At  home,  when  we  come  home,  we  lay  aside  our  mask  and 
drop  our  tools,  and  are  no  longer  lawyers,  sailors,  soldiers,  states- 
men, clergymen,  but  only  men." 

"  I  question  whether  the  home  of  childhood  has  not  more  to  do 
with  religion  than  all  the  teachers  and  the  teaching,  and  the  huge 
unfathomed  folios." 

"  No  idle,  careless,  thoughtless  man,  so  long  as  he  persists  in 
being  what  he  is,  can  endure  the  thought  of  home  any  more  than 
he  can  endure  the  thought  of  God." 

"The  heart  lies  out  under  the  breatli  of  Providence  like  the 
prepared  mirror  of  the  photogenic  draughtsman  ;  the  figure  falls 
there  ;  it  rests  but  a  few  moments,  and  then  passes  away,  and  no 
line  is  seen  ;  but  the  rays  have  eaten  in  and  left  a  form  which 
can  never  be  effaced.  By  and  by  the  acid  touclics  it,  and  there 
lies  the  image,  full  and  faithful  as  the  hand  could  paint  it." 

"The  dull,  uiiiiiipasKioned  voice  [of  conscience]  was  unheard 
among  the  volujjtuous  melodic"  of  her  wishes." 


34  INTRODUCTION. 

"  His  moral  nature  had  been  lowered  down  to  it  before  he  sin- 
ned. .  .  He  was  surprised  to  find  how  easily  .t  Jay  upon  him." 

"  It  swept  over  her  lacerated  heart  like  the  white  squalls  over 
the  hot  seas  of  India,  with  a  fury  too  intense  to  raise  the  waves, 
but  laying  them  all  flat  in  boiling  calm." 

"  He  sunk  down  into  the  barren  waste,  and  the  dry  sands 
rolled  over  him  where  he  lay." 

Probably  no  other  living  writer  has  said  so  many  wise 
things  welh  Some  of  these  are  quoted  in  other  pages  of 
this  sketch.  We  give  below  a  small  collection  of  his 
choice  sayings.  Most  of  these  extracts  convey  opinions 
which  will  command  respect  if  not  belief,  and  at  the 
same  time  illustrate  the  best  qualities  of  the  author's 
style. 

"  Religion,  which  was  a  plaything  to  the  nobles,  was  to  the 
[Scotch]  people  a  clear  matter  of  life  and  death." 

"  Away  at  St.  Andrews,  John  Knox,  broken  in  body,  and 
scarcely  able  to  stagger  up  the  jjulpit  stairs,  still  thundered  in  the 
parish  church  ;  and  his  voice,  it  was  said,  was  like  ten  thousand 
trumpets  braying  in  the  ear  of  Scottish  Protestantism." 

"  We  may  hope  that  no  large  body  of  human  beings  have  for 
any  length  of  time  been  too  dangerously  afraid  of  enjoyment." 

"  Goodness,  though  the  indispensable  adjunct  to  knowledge, 
is  no  substitute  for  it." 

"Like  the  seven  lamps  before  the  throne  of  God,  the  seven 
mighty  angels,  and  the  seven  stars,  the  seven  sacraments  shed 
over  mankind  a  never-ceasing  stream  of  blessed  influences." 

"  As  a  man  can  by  no  possibility  be  doing  anything  but  a  most 
foul  wrong  to  himself  in  getting  drunk,  society  does  him  no 
wrong,  hut  rather  does  him  the  greatest  benefit,  if  it  can  possibly 
keep  him  sober." 

"  In  each  of  the  many  forms  which  Christianity  has  assumed  in 
the  world,  holy  men  have  lived  and  died,  and  have  had  the  wit- 
ness of  the  Spirit  that  they  were  not  far  from  the  truth," 


INTRODLXTION.  6o 

*'  No  sane  man  ever  raised  his  narrow  understanding  into  a 
measure  of  the  possibilities  of  the  universe  ;  nor  does  any  person 
with  any  pretensions  to  religion  disbelieve  in  miracles  of  some 
kind.  ■ 

"  We  cannot  live  on  probabilities.  The  faith  in  which  we  can 
live  bravely  and  die  in  peace  must  be  a  certainty,  so  far  as  it  pro- 
fesses to  be  a  faith  at  all,  or  it  is  nothing." 

'iA  general  doubt  is  coming  up  like  a  thunderstorm  against 
the  wind,  and  blackening  the  sky." 

"Himself  of  most  modest  nature,  he  never  sought  greatness,  but 
greatness  found  him  in  spite  of  himself."* 

"  No  one  who  has  ever  risen  to  any  great  height  in  this  world 
refuses  to  move  till  he  knows  where  he  is  going." 

"  I  hold  that  on  the  obscure  mysteries  of  faith  every  one  should 
be  allowed  to  believe  according  to  his  conscience,  and  that  argu- 
ments on  such  matters  are  either  impertinent  or  useless." 

*'  To  the  bishops  of  Normandy,  Henry  Plantagenet  handed  the 
rope  to  drag  him  to  his  death-bed  of  ashes." 

"  We  are  embarked  in  a  current  which  bears  us  forward  inde- 
pendent of  our  wills,  and  indifferent  whether  we  submit  or  re- 
sist ;  but  each  of  us  is  sailing  in  a  boat  of  his  own,  which,  as  he 
is  hurried  on,  he  can  guide  or  leave  to  drift." 

"'Pickwick,'  delightful  as  it  is  to  us,  will  be  unreadable  to 
our  grandchildren.  The  most  genial  caricature  ceases  to  inter- 
est when  the  thing  caricatured  has  ceased  to  be." 

"  We  look  in  vain  to  liim  [iri  hie]  for  any  in-^i^ht  into  the  com- 
plicated problems  of  huriMnity,  or  for  any  sympathy  with  the 
passions  which  are  tlie  pulses  of  human  life." 

*  This  is  said  of  .Jolin  Henry  Newman.  This  sentence,  be- 
ginning and  ending  with  himseJf,  and  having  a  he  and  a  him,  the 
four  pronouns  among  its  seventeen  words  lopre.senting  the  same 
])erson,  is  not  quoted  here  for  its  beauty,  but  as  an  example  of 
Mr.  Froude's  mastery  over  awkward  combinations  of  worda.  The 
sentence  is  clear  and  aninnlcd.  " 


36  INTKOnUCTION. 

"  To  speak  habitually  with  authority  does  not  necessarily  indi- 
cate an  absence  of  humility,  but  does  not  encourage  the  growth 
of  that  quality." 

"  If  religion  does  not  make  men  more  human  than  they  would 
be  without  it,  it  makes  them  fatally  less  so." 

"  Facts,  it  was  once  said,  were  stubborn  things  ;  but  in  our 
days  we  have  changed  all  that  ;  a  fact,  under  the  knife  of  a  critic, 
splits  in  pieces,  and  is  dissected  out  of  belief  with  incredible 
readiness." 

"There  is  no  person  so  poor  in  his  own  eyes  as  not  to  gaze 
with  pleasure  into  a  looking-glass  ;  and  the  prose  age  may  value 
its  own  image  in  the  novel." 

"  If  we  were  as  familiar  with  the  Iliad  as  with  the  Psalms,  the 
words  of  the  old  Ionian  singer  would  leap  as  naturally  to  our  lips 
as  those  of  the  Israelite  king." 

"At  any  rate,  those  antique  Greeks  did  what  they  said.  We 
say  what  they  said,  while  in  the  same  breath  we  say,  too,  that  it 
is  impossible  to  do  it." 

"  We  cannot  escape  from  our  shadow,  and  the  spirit  of  uncer- 
tainity  will  haunt  the  world  like  an  uneasy  ghost  until  we  take  it 
by  the  throat  like  men." 

"  Unless  men  may  feel  a  cheerful  conviction  that  they  can  do 
right  when  they  try — that  they  can  purify  themselves,  can  live 
noble  and  worthy  lives — unless  this  is  set  before  them  as  the  thing 
which  they  are  to  do,  and  can  succeed  in  doing,  they  will  not 
waste  their  energies  on  what  they  know  beforehand  will  end  in 
failure." 

"  The  force  by  which  a  good  man  tlirows  a  good  action  out  of 
himself  is  invisible  and  mystical,  like  that  which  brings  out  the 
blossom  and  the  fruit  upon  the  tree." 

"  Prophets  have  passed  for  something  as  well  as  priests  in  mak- 
ing God's  will  known,  and  Established  Church  priesthoods  have 
not  been  generally  on  particularly  good  terms  with  prophets. 
The  only  occasion  on  which  the  two  orders  are  said  to  have  been 
in  harmony  was  when  the  prophets  prophesied  lies,  and  the 
priests  bore  rule  in  their  name." 


INTRODUCTION.  37 

"  Let  us  build  our  streets  of  gold,  and  they  will  hide  as  many 
aching  hearts  as  hovels  of  straw  .  .  .  knowledge  is  power  and 
wealth  is  power  ;  and  harnessed,  as  in  Plato's  fable,  to  the  chariot 
of  the  soul,  and  guided  by  wisdom,  they  may  bear  it  through  the 
circle  of  the  stars  ;  but  left  to  their  own  guidance,  or  reined  by  a 
fool's  hand,  the  wild  horses  may  bring  the  poor  fool  to  Phaeton's 
ep,d,  and  set  a  world  on  fire." 

'i,The  age  of  the  saints  has  passed  ;  they  are  no  longer  of  any 
service  to  us  ;  .we_rnust  walk  in  their  spirit,  but  not  along  their 
road." 

**..Tell  a  man  that  no  good  which  he  can  do  is  of  any  value,  and 
depend  upon  it  lie  will  take  you  at  your  word." 

We  will  close  this  sketcli  with  a  few  longer  passages 
taken  from  essays  not  given  in  this  collection. 


I  f 


/ 


"Wherever  \ve  find  them,  they  are  still  the  same.  In  tlv 
courts  of  .Japan  or  of  China  ;  fighting  Spaniards  in  the  Pacific, 
or  prisoners  among  the  Algerines  ;  founding  colonies  which  by 
and  by  were  to  grow  into  enormous  transatlantic  republics,  or 
exploring  in  crazy  pinnaces  the  fierce  latitudes  of  the  polar  seas 
— they  are  the  same  indomitable,  God-fearing  men  whose  life  was 
one  great  liturgy.  '  The  ice  was  strong,  but  God  was  stronger,' 
says  one  of  Frobisher's  men,  after  grinding  a  night  and  a  day 
among  the  icebergs,  not  w'aiting  for  God  to  come  down  and  split 
the  ice  for  them,  but  toiling  through  the  long  hours,  himself  and 
the  rest  fending  off  the  vessel  with  poles  and  planks,  with  death 
glaring  at  them  out  of  the  rocks.  Icebergs  were  strong,  Span- 
iards were  strong,  and  storms,  and  corsairs,  and  rocks  and  reefs, 
which  no  chart  had  then  noted — they  were  all  strong  ;  but  God 
was  stronger,  and  that  was  all  which  they  cared  to  know."* 

"  Beautiful  is  old  ago — beautiful  as  the  slow  dropping  mellow 
autumn  of  a  rich  glorious  summer.  In  the  old  man,  nature  has 
fulfilled  her  work  ;  she  loads  him  with  her  blessings  ;  she  fills 
him  with  the  fruits  of  a  well-spent  life  ;  and,  surrounded  by  his 

*  "  England's  Forgotten  Worthies." 


38  INTRODUCTION". 

cliildrcn  and  his  children's  (;hildrcn,  she  rocks  him  softly  away  to 
a  grave,  to  which  he  is  followed  with  blessings.  God  forbid  we 
should  not  call  it  beautiful.  It  is  beautiful,  but  not  the  most 
beautiful.  There  is  another  life,  hard,  rough,  and  thorny,  trod- 
den with  bleeding  feet  and  aching  brow  ;  the  life  of  which  the 
cross  is  the  symbol  ;  a  battle  v\  hich  no  peace  follows,  this  side 
the  grave  ;  which  the  grave  gapes  to  finish,  before  the  victory  is 
won  ;  and — strange  that  it  should  be  so — this  is  the  highest  life 
of  man.  Look  back  along  the  great  names  of  history  ;  there  is 
none  whose  life  has  been  other  than  this.  They  to  whom  it  has 
been  given  to  do  the  really  highest  work  in  this  earth — whoever 
they  are,  Jew  or  Gentile,  Pagan  or  Christian,  warriors,  legislators, 
philosophers,  priests,  poets,  kings,  slaves — one  and  all,  their  fate 
has  been  the  same — the  same  bitter  cup  has  been  given  to  them  to 
drink."* 

"  The  modern  man's  work,"  Mr.  Carlyle  says,  "  is  no  longer  to 
splinter  lances  or  break  down  walls,  but  to  break  soil,  to  build 
barns  and  factories,  and  to  find  a  high  employment  for  himself  in 
what  hitherto  has  been  despised  as  degrading.  How  to  elevate 
labor — how  to  make  it  beautiful — how  to  enlist  the  sjnrit  in  it 
(for  in  no  other  way  can  it  be  made  humanly  profitable),  that  is 
the  problem  which  he  looks  wistfully  to  the  future  to  solve  for  us. 
He  may  look  to  the  past  as  well  as  to  the  future  ;  in  the  old  Ionia 
he  will  find  all  for  which  he  wishes.  The  wise  Ulysses  built  his 
own  house  and  carved  his  own  bed.  Princes  killed  and  cooked 
their  own  food.  It  was  a  holy  work  with  them — their  way  of 
saying  grace  for  it  ;  for  they  offered  the  animal  in  his  death  to 
the  gods,  and  they  were  not  butchers,  but  sacrificing  priests. 
Even  a  keeper  of  swine  is  called  noble,  and  fights  like  a  hero  ; 
and  the  young  princess  of  Phceacia — the  loveliest  and  gracefulcbt 
of  Homer's  women — drove  the  clothes  cart  and  washed  linen 
with  her  own  beautiful  hands,  i^ot  only  was  labor  free — for  so 
it  was  among  the  early  Romans  ;  or  honorable,  so  it  was  among 
the  Israelites — but  it  was  beautiful — beautiful  in  the  artist's 
sense,  as  perhaps  elewhere  it  has  never  been.  In  later  Greece — 
in  what  we  call  the  glorious  period — toil  had  gathered  about  it 
its  modern  crust  of  supposed  baseness — it  was  left  to  slaves  ;  and 

*  "  England's  Forgotten  Worthies." 


INTRODUCTION.  39 

wise  men,  in  their  philosophic  lecture-rooms,  spoke  of  it  as  un- 
worthy of  the  higher  specimens  of  cultivated  humanity."* 

"  There  is  a  legend  that  at  the  death  of  Charles  V.  the  accusing 
angel  appeared  in  heaven  with  a  catalogue  of  deeds  which  no  ad- 
vocate could  palliate — countries  laid  desolate,  cities  sacked  and 
burned,  lists  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  widows  and  children 
brought  to  misery  by  the  political  ambition  of  a  single  man.  The 
evil  spirit  demanded  the  offender's  soul,  and  it  seemed  as  if  mercy 
itself  could  not  refuse  him  the  award.  But  at  the  last  moment 
the  Supreme  Judge  interfered.  The  Emperor,  He  said,  had  been 
sent -into  the  world  at  a  peculiar  time,  for  a  peculiar  purpose,  and 
Was  not  to  be  tried  by  the  ordinary  rules.  Titian  has  painted  the 
S&ene  :  Charles  kneeling  before  the  Throne,  with  the  conscious- 
ness, as  became  him,  of  human  infirmities,  written  upon  his 
countenance,  yet  neither  afraid  nor  abject,  relying  in  absolute 
faith  that  the  Judge  of  all  mankind  would  do  right. 
'  ''  Of  Caesar,  too,  it  may  be  said  that  he  came  into  the  world  at 
a'  special  time  and  for  a  special  object.  The  old  religions  were 
dead,  from  th^Pillars  of  Hercules  to  the  Euphrates  and  the  Nile, 
and  the  principles  on  which  human  society  had  been  constructed 
were  dead  also.  There  remained  of  spiritual  conviction  only  the 
common  and  human  sense  of  justice  and  morality  ;  and  out  ol 
this  sense  some  ordered  system  of  government  had  to  be  con- 
structed, under  which  quiet  men  could  live  and  labor  and  eat  the 
fruit  of  their  industry.  Under  a  rule  of  this  material  kind  there 
can  be  no  enthusiasm,  no  chivalry,  no  saintly  aspirations,  no  pa- 
triotism of  the  heroic  type.  It  was  not  to  last  forever.  A  new  life 
was  about  to  dawn  for  mankind.  Poetry  and  faith  and  devotion 
were  to  spring  again  out  of  the  seeds  which  were  sleeping  in  the 
heart  of  humanity.  But  the  life  which  is  to  endure  grows  slowly  ; 
and  as  the  soil  must  be  prepared  l)efore  the  wheat  can  be  sown, 
so  before  the  Kingdom  of  £Ieaven  could  throw  up  its  shoots  there 
was  needed  a  kingdom  of  this  world  where  the  nations  were 
neither  torn  in  pieces  by  violence  nor  were  rushing  after  false 
ideals  and  spurious  ambitions.  Such  a  kingdom  was  the  Empire 
of  the  C!a;sars  —  a  kingdom  where  peaceful  men  could  work, 
think,  and  speak  as  they  pleased,  and  travel  freely  among  prov- 

*  "  Essay  on  Homer." 


40  INTRODUCTION. 

inces  ruled  for  the  most  part  by  Gallios,  who  protected  life  and 
property,  and  forbade  fanatics  to  tear  each  otlier  in  pieces  for 
their  religious  opinions.  '  It  is  not  lawful  for  us  to  put  any  man 
to  death,'  was  the  complaint  of  the  Jewish  priests  to  the  Roman 
governor.  Had  Europe  and  Asia  been  covered  with  independent 
nations,  each  with  a  local  religion  represented  in  its  ruling 
powers,  Christianity  must  have  been  stifled  in  its  cradle.  If  St. 
Paul  had  escaped  the  Sanhedrim  at  Jerusalem,  he  would  have 
been  torn  to  pieces  by  the  silversmiths  at  Ephesus.  The  appeal 
to  Caesar's  judgment-seat  was  the  shield  of  his  mission,  and  alone 
made  possible  his  success. 

"  And  this  spirit,  which  confined  government  to  its  simplest 
duties,  while  it  left  opinion  unfettered,  was  especially  present  in 
Julius  Ca;sar  himself." 

Mr.  Fronde's  career  as  a  man  of  letters  is  a  new  proof 
that  adverse  circumstances  are  useful  to  men  of  strengtli. 
If  he  had  not  been  driven  "  to  make  his  way  across  coun- 
try on  the  back  of  literature,"  it  is  not  probable  that  he 
would  have  so  marked  his  journey  as  to  interest  mankind 
in  the  vicissitudes  of  his  life. 

David  H.  "W  heeler. 
*"Casar.     A  Sketch." 


I. 

^r     A  SIDING  AT  A  RAILWAY  STATION. 

'I- 

•''^OME  years  ago  I  was  travelling  by  railway,  no  matter 
whence  or  wliither.      I  was  in  a  second-class  carriage. 
Wq  had  been  long  on  the  road,  and  had  still  some  dis- 
tance  before  us,  when  one   evening    our   journey  was 
brought  unexpectedly  to  an  end  by  the  train  running 
into  a  siding.     The  guards  opened  the  doors,  we  were 
told  that  we  could  proceed  no  further,  and  were  re- 
qufred  to  alight.     The  passengers  were  numerous,  and 
of  all  ranks  ;ujd  sorts.     There  were  third  class,  second, 
first,  with  saloon  carriages  for  several  great  persons  of 
high  distinction.      We  had  ministers  of  state,  judges  on 
circuit,   directors,   leading  men  of  business,  idle  young 
men  of  family  who  were  out  amusing  themselves,  an 
archbishop,  several  ladies,  and  a  duke  and  duchess  with 
their  suite.     Tliese  favored  travellers  had  Pullman  cars 
to  themselves  and  occupied  as  much  room  as  was  allotted 
to  scores  of  plebeians.     I  had  amused  myself  for  several 
days  in  observing  tlie  luxurious  appurtenances  by  which 
they  were  protected  against   discomfort — the    piles   of 
cusliions  and  cloaks,  the  baskets  of  dainties,  the  novels 
and  magazines  to  pass  away  tlie  time,  and  the  profound 
attention  which  they  met  with  fr(nn  the  conductors  and 
Btation-masters  on  the  line.     The  rest  of  us  were  a  mis- 
cellaneous crowd — commercial  people,   lawyers,   artists, 
men   of    letters,  tourists  moving  about   for  pleasure  or 
because  tlicy  liad  nothing  to  do  ;  and  in  the  third-class 


42  SKETCHES    FRCAI    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

carriages,  artisans  and  laborers  in  search  of  work,  women 
looking  for  linsbands  or  for  service,  or  beggars  flying 
from  starvation  in  one  part  of  the  woi'ld  to  find  it  follow 
them  like  their  shadows,  let  them  go  where  they  pleased. 
All  these  were  huddled  together,  feeding  hardly  on  such 
poor  provisions  as  they  carried  with  them  or  could  pick 
up  at  the  stopping-places.  No  more  consideration  was 
shown  them  than  if  they  had  been  so  many  cattle.  But 
they  were  merry  enough  :  songs  and  soumls  of  laughter 
came  from  their  windows,  and  notwithstanding  all  their 
conveniences,  the  languid-looking  fine  people  in  the 
large  compartments  seemed  to  me  to  get  through  their 
journey  with  less  enjoyment  after  all  than  their  poor 
fellow-travellers.  These  last  appeared  to  be  of  tougher 
texture,  to  care  less  for  being  jolted  and  shaken,  to  be 
better-humored  and  kinder  to  one  another.  They  had 
found  life  go  hard  with  them  wherever  they  had  been, 
and  not  being  accustomed  to  have  everything  which  they 
wished  for,  they  were  less  selfish  and  more  considerate. 
The  intimation  that  our  journey  was  for  the  present 
'it  an  end  came  on  most  of  us  as  an  unpleasant  surprise. 
The  grandees  got  out  in  a  high  state  of  indignation. 
They  called  for  their  servants,  but  their  servants  did  not 
hear  them,  or  laughed  and  passed  on.  The  conductors 
had  forgotten  to  be  obsequious.  All  classes  on  the 
platform  were  suddenly  on  a  level.  A  beggar-woman 
hustled  the  duchess  as  she  was  standing  astonished 
because  her  maid  had  left  her  to  carry  her  own  bag. 
The  patricians  were  pushed  about  among  the  crowd  with 
no  more  concern  than  if  they  had  been  common  mortals. 
They  demanded  loudly  to  see  the  station-master.  The 
minister  complained  angrily  of  the  delay  ;  an  important 
negotiation  would  be  imperilled  by  his  detention,  and  he 
threatened    the    company  with   the    displeasure    of   his 


A    SIDIXG    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATION.  43 

depaitnient.  A  consequential  youth  who  had  just  lieard 
of  the  death  of  his  eJder  brotlier  vras  flying  home  to 
take  his  inlieritance.  A  great  lady  had  secured,  as  she 
liad  hoped,  a  brilliant  match  for  her  daughter ;  her 
work  over,  she  had  been  at  the  baths  to  recover  from 
the  dissipation  of  the  season  ;  difficulty  had  risen  un- 
looked  for,  and  unless  she  was  at  hand  to  remove  it,  the 
vn^rst  consequences  might  be  feared.  A  banker  declared 
that  the  credit  of  a  leading  commercial  house  might  fail 
unless  he  could  be  at  home  on  the  day  fixed  for  his 
jefeum  :  he  alone  could  save  it.  A  solicitor  had  the 
evidence  in  his  portmanteau  which  would  determine  the 
succession  to  the  lands  and  title  of  an  ancient  family. 
An  elderly  gentleman  was  in  despair  al)out  his  young 
wjfe  whom  he  had  left  at  home  ;  he  had  made  a  will  by 
which  she  was  to  lose  his  fortune  if  she  married  again 
after  his  dftith,  but  the  will  was  lying  in  his  desk 
unsigned.  The  archbishop  was  on  his  way  to  a  synod 
where  the  great  question  was  to  be  discussed  whether 
gas  might  be  used  at  the  altar  instead  of  candles.  The 
altar  candles  were  blessed  before  they  were  used,  and 
the  doubt  was  whether  gas  could  be  blessed.  The 
right  reverend  prelate  conceived  that  if  the  gas-tubes 
were  made  in  the  shape  of  candles  the  difficulty  could  be 
got  over,  but  he  feared  that  without  his  moderating 
influence  the  majority  might  come  to  a  rash  decision. 
All  these,  persons  were  clamoring  over  their  various 
anxieties  with  the  most  naive  frankness,  the  trutli 
coming  freely  out,  whatever  it  might  be.  One  distin- 
guished looking  lady  in  deep  mourning,  with  a  sad 
gentle  face,  alone  was  resigned  and  hopeful.  It  seemed 
that  her  husband  had  been  stopped  not  long  before  at  the 
same  station.  She  thought  it  possible  that  she  might 
meet  him  again. 


44  SKETCHES   FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

The  st.ation-iiiaster  listened  to  the  complaints  with 
composed  indifference.  He  told  the  londest  that  they 
need  not  alarm  themselves.  The  State  would  survive 
the  absence  of  the  minister.  The  minister,  in  fact,  was 
not  thinking  of  the  State  at  all,  but  of  the  party  triumph 
wliich  he  expected  ;  and  the  peerage  which  was  to  be  his 
reward,  the  station-master  said  would  now  be  of  no  use 
to  him.  The  youth  had  a  second  brother  who  would 
succeed  instead  of  him,  and  tlie  tenants  would  not  be 
inconvenienced  by  the  change.  The  fine  lady's  daughter 
would  marry  to  her  own  liking  instead  of  her  mother's, 
and  would  be  all  the  happier  for  it.  The  commercial 
house  was  already  insolvent,  and  the  longer  it  lasted  the 
more  innocent  people  would  be  ruined  by  it.  The  boy 
whom  the  lawyer  intended  to  make  into  a  rich  baronet 
was  now  working  industriously  at  school,  and  would 
grow  up  a  useful  man.  If  a  great  estate  fell  in  to  him 
he  would  be  idle  and  dissolute.  The  old  man  might 
congratulate  himself  that  he  liad  escaped  so  soon  from 
the  scrape  into  which  he  had  fallen.  His  wife  would 
marry  an  adventurer,  and  would  suffer  worse  from 
inheriting  his  fortune.  The  archbishop  was  commended 
for  his  anxiety.  His  solution  of  the  candle  problem  was 
no  doubt  an  excellent  one  ;  but  his  clergy  were  now 
provided  with  a  harmless  subject  to  quarrel  over,  and  if 
it  was  adopted  they  might  fall  out  over  something  else 
which  miglit  be  seriously  mischievous. 

"  Do  you  mean,  then,  that  you  are  not  going  to  send 
us  forward  at  all  ?"  the  minister  inquired  sternly. 

"  You  will  see,"  the  station-master  answered  with  a 
curious  short  laugh.  I  observed  that  lie  looked  more 
gently  at  tlie  lady  in  mourning.  She  had  said  noth- 
ing, but  he  knew  what  was  in  her  mind,  and  though 
he  held  out  no  hope  in  words  that  her  wish  would  be 


A   SIDING    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATION".  45 

gra titled,  he  smiled  sadly,  and  the  irony  passed  out  of 
his  face. 

The  crowd,  meanwhile,  were  standing  about  the 
platform  whistling  tunes  or  amusing  themselves,  not  ill- 
naturedly,  at  the  distress  of  their  grand  com])anions. 
Something  considerable  M^as  happening.  But  they  had 
so  long  experienced  the  ups  and  downs  of  things  that 
tliey  were  prepared  for  what  fortune  might  send.     They 

'ihd  not  expected  to  find  a  Paradise  where  they  were 
going,  and  one  place  might  be  as  good  as  another.  They 
iiad  nothing  belonging  to  them  except  the  clothes  they 

'stood  in  and  their  bits  of  skill  in  their  different  trades. 
^Ylierever  men  were,  there  would  be  need  of  cobblers 
and  tailors,   and  smiths  and  carpenters.     If  not,   they 

'  might  fall  on  their  feet  somehow  if  there  was  work  to 
•De  done  of  any  sort. 

Presentl}i,a  bell  rang,  a  door  was  flung  open,  and  we 
were  ordered  into  a  waiting-room,  where  we  were  told 
that  our  luggage  was  to  be  examined.  It  was  a  large, 
barely  furnished  apartment,  like  the  salle  d^attente  at 
the  ^Northern  Ilailway  Station  at  Paris.  A  rail  ran 
across,  behind  which  we  were  all  penned  ;  opposite  to 
us  was  the  usual  long  table,  on  which  were  piled  boxes, 
bags,  and  portmanteaus,  and  behind  them  stood  a  row  of 
officials,  in  a  plain  uniform  wnth  gold  bands  round  their 
caps,  and  the  dry  peremptory  manner  which  passengers 
accustomed  to  deference  so  particularly  dislike.  At 
their  backs  was  a  screen  extending  across  the  room, 
reaching  half  way  to  the  ceiling  ;  in  the  rear  of  it  there 
was  apparently  an  office. 

We  each  looked  to  see  that  our  particular  belongings 
were  safe,  but  we  were  surprised  to  find  that  we  could 
recognize  none  of  them.  Packages  there  were  in 
plenty,    alleged   to   be   tlic    property  of   the   passengers 


46  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

who  had  come  in  by  the  train.  They  were  arranged  in 
the  three  classes — first,  second,  and  third— but  the  pro- 
portions were  inverted  :  most  of  it  was  labelled  as  the 
luggage  of  the  travellers  in  fustian,  who  had  brought 
nothing  with  them  but  what  they  carried  in  their  hands  ; 
a  moderate  heap  stood  where  the  second-class  luggage 
should  have  been,  and  some  of  superior  quality,  but 
none  of  us  could  make  out  the  shapes  of  our  own  trunks. 
As  to  the  grand  ladies  and  gentlemen,  the  innumerable 
articles  which  I  had  seen  put  as  theirs  into  the  van 
were  nowhere  to  be  found.  A  few  shawls  and  cloaks 
lay  upon  the  planks,  and  that  was  all.  There  was  a 
loud  outcry,  but  the  officials  were  accustomed  to  it,  and 
took  no  notice.  The  station-master,  who  was  still  in 
charge  of  us,  said  briefly  that  the  saloon  luggage  would 
be  sent  forward  in  the  next  train.  The  late  owners 
would  have  no  more  use  for  it,  and  it  would  be  delivered 
to  their  friends. 

The  late  owners  !  Were  we  no  longer  actual  owners, 
then  ?  My  individual  loss  was  not  great,  and,  besides,  it 
might  be  made  up  to  me,  for  1  saw  my  name  on  a 
strange  box  on  the  table,  and  being  of  curious  disposi- 
tion, the  singularity  of  the  adventure  made  it  interesting 
to  me.  The  consternation  of  the  rest  was  indescribable. 
The  minister  supposed  that  he  had  fallen  among  Com- 
munists, who  disbeheved  in  property,  and  was  beginning 
a  speech  on  the  elementary  conditions  of  society,  when 
silence  was  called,  and  the  third-class  passengers  were 
ordered  to  advance,  that  their  boxes  might  be  opened. 
Each  man  had  his  own  carefully  docketed.  The  lids 
flew  off,  and  within,  instead  of  clothes  and  shoes  and 
dressing  apparatus  and  money  and  jewels  and  such  like, 
were  simply  samples  of  the  work  which  he  had  done  in 
his  life.     There  was  an  account-book,  also,  in  which  was 


A    SIDIKG    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATION.  47 

entered  the  number  of  days  which  he  had  worked,  the 
number  and  size  of  the  fields,  etc. ,  which  he  liad  drained 
and  inclosed  and  ploughed,  the  crops  which  he  had 
reaped,  the  walls  which  he  had  built,  the  metal  which 
he  had  dug  out  and  smelted  and  fashioned  into  articles  of 
use  to  mankind,  the  leather  which  he  had  tanned,  the 
clothes  which  he  had  woven — all  entered  with  punctual 
exactness  ;  and  on  the  opposite  page,  the  wages  which  he 
fiafl.  received,  .  and  the  share  which  had  been  allotted 
to  .him  of  the  good  things  which  he  had  helped  to 
ci-eate. 

Besides  his  work,  so  specifically  called,  there  were  his 
actions — his  affection  for  his  parents,  or  his  wife  and 
children,  his  self-denials,  his  charities,  his  purity,  his 
truth,  his  honesty,  or,  it  might  be,  ugly  catalogues  of 
sifis  and  oaths  and  drunkenness  and  brutality.  But 
inquiry  into  action  was  reserved  for  a  second  investiga- 
tion before  a  higher  commissioner.  The  first  examina- 
tion was  confined  to  the  literal  work  done  by  each  man 
for  the  general  good — -how  much  he  had  contribnted, 
and  how  much  society  had  done  for  him  in  return  ;  and 
no  one,  it  seemed,  could  bo  allowed  to  go  any  further 
without  a  certificate  of  having  passed  this  test  satisfac- 
torily. With  the  workmen,  the  balance  in  most  in- 
stances was  found  enormously  in  their  favor.  The  state 
of  the  case  was  so  clear  that  the  scrutiny  was  rapidly  got 
over,  and  they  and  their  luggage  were  passed  into  the 
higher  court.  A  few  were  found  whose  boxes  were 
empty,  who  had  done  nothing  useful  all  their  lives,  and 
had  subsisted  !)y  begging  and  stealing.  These  were 
ordered  to  stand  aside  till  the  rest  of  us  had  been  dis- 
posed of. 

The  saloon  passengers  were  taken  next.  Most  of 
them,  who  had   nothing  at  all  to  show,  were  called  up 


48  SKETCHES    FEOM   J.  A.   FROUDE. 

together,  and  were  asked  what  they  had  to  say  for 
themselves.  A  Avell-dressed  gentleman,  who  spoke  for 
tlie  rest,  said  that  the  whole  investigation  was  a  mystery 
to  him.  He  and  his  friends  had  been  born  to  good 
fortunes,  and  had  fomid  themselves,  on  entering  upon 
life,  amply  provided  for.  They  had  never  been  told 
that  work  was  required  of  them,  either  work  with  their 
hands  or  work  with  their  heads — in  fact,  work  of  any 
kind.  It  was  right,  of  course,  for  the  poor  to  work, 
because  they  could  n(jt  honestly  live  otherwise.  For 
themselves,  they  had  spent  their  time  in  amusements, 
generally  innocent.  They  had  paid  for  everything  which 
they  had  consumed.  They  had  stolen  nothing,  taken 
nothing  from  any  man  by  violence  or  fraud.  They  had 
kept  the  commandments,  all  ten  of  them,  from  the  time 
when  they  were  old  enough  to  understand  them.  The 
speaker,  at  least,  declared  that  he  had  no  breach  of  any 
commandment  on  his  own  conscience,  and  he  believed 
he  might  say  as  much  of  his  companions.  They  were 
supei'ior  people,  who  had  been  always  looked  up  to  and 
well  spoken  of,  and  to  call  upon  them  to  show  what 
they  had  done  was  against  reason  and  equity. 

"  Gentlemen,"  said  the  chief  official,  "  we  have  heard 
this  many  times  ;  yet  as  often  as  it  is  rej^eated  we  feel 
fresh  astonishment.  You  have  been  in  a  world  where 
work  is  the  condition  of  life.  Not  a  meal  can  be  had  by 
any  man  that  some  one  has  not  worked  to  produce. 
Those  who  work  deserve  to  eat  ;  those  who  do  not  work 
deserve  to  starve.  There  are  but  three  ways  of  living  : 
by  working,  by  stealing,  or  by  begging.  Those  who 
have  not  hved  by  the  first  have  lived  by  one  of  the 
other  two.  And  no  matter  how  superior  you  think 
yourselves,  you  will  not  pass  here  till  you  have  some- 
thing of   your  own   to   produce.     You  have  had  your 


A    SIDING    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATION.  49 

wages  beforehand — ample  wages,   as  you  acknowledge 
yourselves.     What  have  you  to  show  ?" 

"Wages!"  the  speaker  said.  "We  are  not  hired 
servants  ;  we  received  no  wages.  What  we  spent  was 
our  o"^Ti.  All  the  orders  we  received  were  that  we  were 
not  to  do  wrong.  We  have  done  no  wrong.  I  appeal 
to  the  higher  court. " 
-  But  the  appeal  could  not  be  received.  To  all  who 
presented  themselves  with  empty  boxes,  no  matter  who 
they  were,  or  how  excellent  their  characters  appeared  to 
one  another,  there  was  the  irrevocable  answer,  "  Ko 
admittance,  till  you  come  better  furnished."  All  who 
were  in  this  condition,  the  duke  and  duchess  among 
them,  were  ordered  to  stand  aside  with  the  thieves. 
The  duchess  declared  that  she  had  given  the  finest 
parties  in  the  season,  and  as  it  was  universally  agreed 
that  they  had  been  the  most  tedious,  and  that  no  one  had 
found  any  pleasure  there,  a  momentary  doubt  rose 
whether  thev  mi"'ht  not  have  answered  some  useful 
purpose  in  disgusting  people  with  such  modes  of  enter- 
tainment ;  but  no  evidence  of  this  was  forthcoming  : 
the  world  had  attended  them  because  the  world  had 
nothing  else  to  do  ;  and  she  and  her  guests  had  been 
alike  unprofitable.  Thus  the  large  majority  of  the  saloon 
passengers  was  disposed  of.  The  minister,  the  ai'ch- 
bishop,  the  lawyer,  the  banker,  and  others,  who,  al- 
though they  had  no  material  work  credited  to  tiiem, 
had  yet  been  active  and  lal^orious  in  their  dilferent 
callings,  were  passed  to  the  superior  judges.  Our  turn 
came  next — ours  of  the  second  class — and  a  motley 
gathering  we  were.  Busy  we  must  all  have  been,  from 
the  multitude  of  articles  which  we  found  assigned  to  us. 
Manufa{;turers  with  their  w^ares,  solicitors  witli  tliuir 
lawsuits,    doctors   and    clergymen    with    the   bodies  aTn! 


50  SKETCHES    I'ROM    .!.    A,   FKOUDE. 

souls  which  they  had  saved  or  lost,  authors  with  their 
books,  painters  and  sculptors  with  their  pictures  and 
statues.  But  the  hard  test  was  applied  to  all  that  we 
had  produced — the  wages  which  we  had  received  on  one 
side,  and  the  value  of  our  exertions  to  mankind  on  the 
other — and  imposing  as  our  performances  looked  when 
laid  out  to  be  examined,  we  had  been  paid,  most  of  us, 
out  of  all  proportion  to  what  we  were  found  to  have 
deserved.  I  was  reminded  of  a  large  compartment  in  the 
Paris  Exhibition,  where  an  active  gentleman,  wishing 
to  show  the  state  of  English  literature,  had  collected 
copies  of  every  book,  review,  pamphlet,  or  newspaper 
which  had  been  published  in  a  single  year.  The  bulk 
was  overwhelming,  but  the  figures  were  only  decimal 
points,  and  the  worth  of  the  whole  was  a  fraction  above 
zero.  A  few  of  us  were  turned  back  summarily  among 
the  thieves  and  the  fine  gentlemen  and  ladies  :  specula- 
tors who  had  done  nothing  but  handle  money  which  had 
clung  to  their  fingers  in  passing  through  them,  divines 
who  had  preached  a  moraUty  which  they  did  not  prac- 
tise, and  fluent  orators  who  had  made  speeches  which 
they  knew  to  Ijo  nonsense,  philosophers  who  had  spun 
out  of  moonshine  systems  of  the  universe,  distinguished 
pleaders  who  had  defeated  justice  wliile  they  estalJished 
points  of  law,  writers  of  books  upon  subjects  of  which 
tliey  knew  enough  to  mislead  their  readers,  purveyors  of 
luxuries  which  had  added  nothing  to  human  health  or 
strength,  physicians  and  apothecaries  who  had  pretended 
to  knowledge  which  they  knew  that  they  did  not  pos- 
sess— these  all,  as  the  contents  of  their  boxes  bore 
M'itness  against  them,  w^ere  thrust  back  into  the  rejected 
herd. 

There  were  some  whose  account  stood  better  as  having 
vit  \east  produced  somctliing  of  real  merit,  but  they  wcru 


A    SIDING    AT   A    RAILWAY    STATIOX.  51 

cast  on  the  point  of  wages  ;  modest  excellence  Lad  come 
badly  off  ;  the  plansible  and  niiscrnpulons  had  thriven 
and  grown  rich.  It  was  tragical,  and  evidently  a  snr- 
prise  to  most  of  us,  to  see  how  mendacious  we  had  been  : 
how  we  had  sanded  our  sugar,  watered  our  milk,  scamped 
our  carpentering  and  mason's  work,  literally  and  meta- 
phorically ;  how  in  all  things  we  had  been  thinking  less  of 
producing  good  work  than  of  the  profit  which  we  could 
make  out  of  it  ;  how  we  had  sold  ourselves  to  tell  lies 
and  act  them,  because  the  public  found  lies  pleasant  and 
tnith  expensive  and  troublesome.  Some  of  us  were 
manifest  rogues,  who  had  bought  cheap  and  sold  dear, 
had  used  false  measures  and  weights,  had  made  cotton 
pass  for  wool,  and  hemp  for  silk,  and  tin  for  silver.  The 
American  pedlar  happened  to  be  in  the  party  w^lio  had 
pUt  a  rind  upon  a  grindstone  and  had  sold  it  as  a  cheese. 
These  werq.  promptly  sifted  out  and  placed  with  their 
fellows  ;  only  persons  whose  services  were  on  the  whole 
greater  than  the  pay  which  they  had  received  were 
allowed  their  certificates.  When  my  own  ])ox  was 
opened,  I  perceived  that  though  the  wages  luul  ])oen 
small  the  work  done  seemed  smaller  still,  and  I  was 
surprised  to  find  myself  among  those  who  had  passed. 

The  whistle  of  a  train  was  heard  at  this  moment 
coming  in  upon  the  nuiin  line.  It  was  to  go  on  in  half 
an  hour,  and  those  who  had  been  turned  back  were  told 
that  they  were  to  proceed  by  it  to  the  pla(;e  wliere  they 
liad  been  originally  going.  Tliey  looked  infinitely 
relieved  at  the  news  ;  but,  before  they  started,  a  few 
questions  had  to  be  put  to  them,  and  a  few  alterations 
made  which  were  to  affect  their  future.  They  were 
asked  to  explain  how  they  ha<i  come  to  be  such  worthless 
creatures.  They  gave  many  answers,  which  came  mainly 
to  tlie    same    thing.      Circumstances    liad    been    against 


52  BKETOHEt   FROM   J.   A.  FROUDE. 

them.  It  was  all  owing  to  circumstances.  They  had 
been  badly  brought  up.  They  had  been  placed  in 
situations  where  it  had  been  impossible  for  them  to  do 
better.  The  rich  people  repeated  that  they  had  never 
been  informed  that  any  work  was  expected  of  them. 
Their  wants  had  all  been  provided  for,  and  it  was  unfair 
to  expect  that  they  should  have  exerted  themselves  of 
their  own  accord  when  they  had  no  motive  for  working. 
If  they  had  only  been  bom  poor,  all  would  have  gone 
well  with  them.  The  cheating  tradesmen  declared  that 
the  first  duty  of  a  shopkeeper,  according  to  all  received 
principles,  was  to  make  money  and  better  his  condition. 
It  was  the  buyer's  business  to  see  to  the  quality  of  the 
articles  which  he  purchased  ;  the  shopkeeper  was  entitled 
to  sell  his  wares  at  the  highest  price  which  he  could  get 
for  them.  So,  at  least,  it  was  believed  and  taught  by 
the  recognized  authorities  on  the  subject.  The  orators, 
preachers,  newspaper  writers,  novel-writers,  etc.,  etc., 
of  whom  there  were  a  great  many,  appealed  to  the 
crowds  who  came  to  listen  to  them,  or  bought  and  read 
their  productions.  Tout  le  monde,  it  was  said,  was 
wiser  than  the  wisest  single  sage.  They  had  given  the 
world  what  the  world  wished  for  and  approved  ;  they 
had  worked  at  supplying  it  with  all  their  might,  and  it 
was  extremely  hard  to  blame  them  for  guiding  them- 
selves by  the  world's  judgment.  The  thieves  and 
vagabonds  argued  that  they  had  been  brought  into 
existence  without  their  consent  being  asked  :  they  had 
not  wished  for  it  ;  although  they  had  not  been  without 
their  pleasures,  they  regarded  existence  on  the  whole  as 
a  nuisance  which  they  would  gladly  have  been  spared. 
Being  alive,  however,  they  had  to  keep  alive  ;  and  for 
all  that  they  could  see,  they  had  as  full  a  right  to  the 
good  things  which  the  world  contained  as  anybody  else. 


A    SIDIXG    AT   A    RAILWAY    STATION.  53 

provided  tliej  could  get  them.  They  were  called 
thieves.  Law  and  language  were  made  by  the  property 
owners,  who  were  their  natural  enemies.  If  society  had 
given  them  the  means  of  living  honestly  they  would 
have  found  it  easy  to  be  honest.  Society  had  done 
nothing  for  them — why  should  they  do  anything  for 
society  ? 

-;  So,  in  their  various  wavs  those  who  had  been 
"' plucked"  defended  themselves.  They  were  all  de- 
lighted to  hear  that  they  were  to  have  another  chance  ; 
and  I  was  amused  to  observe  that  though  some  of  them 
had  pretended  that  they  had  not  wished  to  be  born,  and 
had  rather  not  have  been  born,  not  one  of  them  pro- 
tested against  being  sent  back.  All  they  asked  was  that 
they  should  be  put  in  a  new  position,  and  that  the  adverse 
influences  should  be  taken  off.  I  expected  thai  among 
these  adverse  influences  thev  would  have  mentioned  the 
faults  of  their  own  dispositions.  My  own  opinion  had 
been  that  half  the  misdoings  of  men  came  from  con- 
genital defects  of  character  which  they  had  brought  witli 
them  into  the  world,  and  that  constitutional  courage, 
right-mindedness,  and  practical  ability  M'ere  as  much 
gifts  of  nature  or  circumstance  as  the  accidents  of 
fortune.  A  change  in  this  respect  was  of  more  con- 
sequence than  in  any  other.  But  with  themselves  they 
were  all  apparently  satisfied,  and  they  required  only  an 
improvement  in  their  surroundings.  The  alterations 
were  rapidly  made.  The  duchess  was  sent  to  begin  her 
life  again  in  a  laborer's  cottage.  She  was  to  attend  the 
village  school,  and  rise  thence  into  a  housemaid.  The 
fine  gentleman  was  made  a  ploughboy.  The  authors 
and  preachers  were  to  become  mechanics,  and  bound 
apprentices  to  carpenters  and  blacksmiths.  A  j)hilos- 
opher,  who,  having  had  a  good  fortune  and   unbroken 


54  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FROUDE. 

health,  had  insisted  that  the  world  was  as  good  as  it 
could  be  made,  was  to  be  born  blind  and  paralytic,  and 
to  find  his  way  through  life  under  the  new  conditions. 
The  thieves  and  cheats,  who  pretended  that  their  mis- 
demeanors were  due  to  poverty,  were  to  find  them- 
selves, when  they  arrived  in  the  world  again,  in  palaces 
surrounded  with  luxury.  The  cup  of  Lethe  was  sent 
round.  The  past  became  a  blank.  They  were  hurried 
into  the  train  ;  the  engine  screamed  and  flew  away  with 
them. 

"  They  will  be  all  here  again  in  a  few  years,"  the 
stationmaster  said,  "  and  it  will  be  the  same  story  over 
again,  I  have  had  these  very  people  in  my  hands  a 
dozen  times.  They  have  been  tried  in  all  positions,  and 
there  is  still  nothing  to  show,  and  nothing  but  complaints 
of  circumstances.  For  my  part,  I  would  put  them  out 
altoo-ether. "  "How  lono;  is  it  to  last?"  I  asked. 
"  Well,"  he  said,  "  it  does  not  depend  on  me.  No 
one  passes  here  who  cannot  prove  that  he  has  lived  to 
some  purpose.  Some  of  the  worst  I  have  known  made 
at  last  into  pigs  and  geese,  to  be  fatted  up  and  eaten, 
and  made  of  use  in  that  M^ay.  Others  have  become 
asses,  condemned  to  carry  burdens,  to  be  beaten  with 
sticks,  and  to  breed  asses  like  themselves  for  a  hundred 
generations.  All  animated  creatures  tend  to  take  the 
shape  at  last  which  suits  their  character." 

The  train  was  scarcely  out  of  sight  when  again  the 
bell  rang.  The  scene  changed  as  at  a  theati*e.  The 
screen  was  rolled  back,  and  we  who  were  left  found 
ourselves  in  the  presence  of  four  grave-looking  persons, 
like  the  board  of  examiners  whom  we  remembered  at 
college.  We  were  called  upon  one  by  one.  The  work 
which  had  passed  the  first  ordeal  was  again  looked  into, 
and  the  quality  of  it  compared  with  the  talent  or  faculty 


A    SIDIXG    AT    A    RAILWAY    .•STATION.  55 

of  the  producer,  to  see  how  far  he  had  done  his  best  ; 
•whether  anywhere  he  had  done  worse  than  he  might 
have  done  and  knew  how  to  have  done  ;  while  besides, 
in  a  separate  collection,  were  the  vices,  the  sins,  the 
selfishnesses,  and  ill-lraniors,  with,  in  the  other  scale, 
the  acts  of  personal  duty,  of  love  and  kindness  and 
charity,  which  had  increased  the  happiness  or  lightened 
the  sorrows  of  those  connected  with  him.  These  last, 
I  observed,  had  generally  been  forgotten  by  the  owner, 
who  saw  them  appear  with  surprise,  and  even  repudiated 
them  with  protest.  In  the  work,  of  course,  both  ma- 
terial and  moral,  there  was  every  gradation,  both  of 
kind  and  merit.  But  while  nothing  was  absolutely 
worthless,  everything,  even  the  highest  achievements  of 
the  greatest  artist  or  the  greatest  saint,  fell  short  of 
absolute  perfection.  Each  of  us  saw  our  own  perform- 
ances, from  ^ur  first  ignorant  beginnings  to  what  we 
regarded  as  our  greatest  triumph  ;  and  it  was  easy  to 
trace  how  much  of  our  faults  were  due  to  natural  de- 
ficiencies and  the  necessary  failures  of  inexperience,  and 
how  much  to  self-will  or  vanity  or  idleness.  Some  taint 
of  mean  motives,  too,  some  desire  of  reward,  desire  of 
praise  or  honor  or  wealth,  some  foolish  self-satisfaction, 
when  satisfaction  ought  not  to  have  been  felt,  was  to  be 
Been  infecting  everything,  even  the  very  best  which  was 
presented  for  scrutiny. 

So  plain  was  this  that  one  of  us,  an  earnest,  "Impressive- 
looking  person,  whose  own  work  bore  inspection  better 
than  that  of  most  of  us.  exclaimed  passionately  that,  so 
far  as  he  was  concerned,  the  examiners  might  spare  their 
labor.  From  his  earliest  years  he  had  known  what  he 
ought  to  do,  and  in  no  instance  had  he  ever  completely 
done  it.  He  had  struggled  ;  he  had  conquered  his 
grosser  faults  ;  but  the  farther  he  had  gone,  and  the 


56  SKETCHES    FROM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

better  he  Lad  been  able  to  do,  liis  knowledge  liad  still 
grown  faster  than  his  power  of  acting  upon  it  ;  and 
every  additional  day  that  he  had  lived  his  shortcomings 
had  become  more  miserably  plain  to  him.  Even  if  he 
could  have  reached  perfection  at  last,  he  could  not  undo 
the  past,  and  the  faults  of  his  youth  would  bear  witness 
against  him  and  call  for  his  condemnation.  Therefore, 
he  said,  he  abhorred  himself.  He  had  no  merit  which 
could  entitle  him  to  look  for  favor.  He  had  labored  on 
to  the  end,  but  he  had  labored  with  a  full  knowledge 
that  the  best  which  he  could  offer  would  be  unworthy 
of  acceptance.  He  had  been  told,  and  he  believed,  that 
a  high  spirit,  not  subject  to  infirmity,  had  done  his  work 
for  him,  and  done  it  perfectly,  and  that  if  he  abandoned 
all  claim  on  his  own  account  he  might  be  accepted  for 
the  sake  of  what  another  had  done.  This,  he  trusted, 
was  true,  and  it  was  his  sole  dependence.  In  the  so- 
called  good  actions  with  which  he  seemed  to  be  credited, 
there  was  nothing  that  was  really  good  ;  there  was  not 
one  which  was  altogether  what  it  ought  to  have  been. 

He  was  evidently  sincere,  and  what  he  said  was  un- 
doubtedly true — true  of  him  and  true  of  every  one. 
Even  in  the  vehemence  of  his  self-abandonment  a  trace 
lingered  of  the  taint  which  he  was  confessing,  for  he 
was  a  polemical  divine  ;  he  had  spent  his  life  and  gained 
a  reputation  in  maintaining  this  particular  doctrine.  He 
believed  it,  but  he  had  not  forgotten  that  he  had  been 
himself  its  champion. 

The  examiner  looked  kindly  at  him  ;  but  answered, 
"  We  do  not  expect  impossibilities  ;  and  we  do  not  blame 
you  when  you  have  not  accomplished  what  is  beyond 
your  strength.  Only  those  who  are  themselves  perfect 
can  do  anything  perfectly.  Human  beings  are  born 
ignorant  and  helj^less.     They  bring  into  the  world  with 


A    SIDIXG    AT   A    RAILWAY    STATION.  57 

them  a  disposition  to  seek  what  is  pleasant  to  them- 
selves, and  what  is  pleasant  is  not  always  right.  They 
learn  to  live  as  they  learn  everything  else.  At  lirst  they 
cannot  do  rightly  at  all.  They  improve  under  teaching 
and  practice.  The  best  only  arrive  at  excellence.  We 
do  not  find  fault  with  the  painter  on  account  of  his  first 
l)ad  copies,  if  they  were  as  good  as  could  be  looked  for  at 
his  age.  Every  craftsman  acquires  his  art  by  degrees. 
lie  begins  badly  ;  he  cannot  help  it  ;  and  it  is  the  same 
with  life.  You  learn  to  walk  by  falling  down.  You 
learn  to  live  by  going  wrong  and  experiencing  the  con- 
sequences of  it.  We  do  not  record  against  a  man  '  the 
sins  of  his  youth,'  if  he  has  been  honestly  trying  to 
improve  himself.  We  do  not  require  the  same  self- 
control  in  a  child  as  in  a  man.  We  do  not  require  the 
same  attainments  from  all.  Some  are  well  taught,  some 
are  ill  taught^^some  are  not  taught  at  all.  Some  have 
naturally  good  dispositions,  some  have  naturally  bad 
dispositions.  Kot  one  has  had  power  '  to  fulfil  the  law,' 
as  you  call  it,  completely.  Therefore,  it  is  no  crime  in 
lu'ra  if  he  fails.  We  reckon  as  faults  those  only  which 
arised  from  idleness,  wilfulness,  selfishness,  and  delib- 
erate preference  of  evil  to  good.  Each  is  judged  accord- 
ing to  what  he  has  received." 

I  was  amused  to  observe  how  pleased  the  archbishop) 
looked  while  the  examiner  was  speaking.  lie  had  him- 
self been  engaged  in  controversy  with  this  gentleman  on 
the  share  of  "  good  M'orks"  in  justifying  a  man,  and  if 
the  examiner  had  not  taken  his  side  in  the  discussion  he 
had  at  least  demolished  his  adversary.  The  archbishop 
had  been  the  more  disinterested  in  the  line  which  he  had 
taken,  as  his  own  "  works,"  though  in  several  large 
folios,  weighed  extremely  little  ;  and,  indeed,  had  it  not 
been  for  passages  in  his  early  life — he  had  starved  him- 


58  SKETCHES    FKO.M    J.   A.    FROCDE. 

self  at  college  that  lie  might  not  be  a  burden  upon  his 
widowed  mother — I  do  not  know  but  that  he  might  have 
been  sent  back  into  the  world  to  serve  as  a  parish  clerk. 

For  myself,  there  were  questions  which  I  was  longing 
to  ask,  and  I  was  trying  to  collect  my  courage  to  speak. 
1  wanted  chiefly  to  know  what  the  examiner  meant  by 
"natural  disposition."  Was  it  that  a  man  might  be 
born  with  a  natural  capacity  for  becoming  a  saint, 
another  man  with  a  capacity  to  become  a  great  artist  or 
musician,  and  that  each  of  us  could  only  grow  to  the 
limits  of  his  natural  powers  ?  And,  again,  were  idle- 
ness, wilfulness,  selfishness,  etc.,  etc.,  natural  disposi- 
tions ? — for  in  that  case — 

But  at  the  moment  the  bell  rang  again,  and  my  own 
name  was  called.  There  was  no  occasion  to  ask  who  1 
was.  In  every  instance  the  identity  of  the  person,  his 
history,  small  or  large,  and  all  that  he  had  said  or  done, 
was  placed  before  the  court  so  clearly  that  there  was  no 
need  for  extorting  a  confession.  There  stood  the 
catalogue  inexorably  impartial,  the  bad  actions  in  a 
schedule  painfully  large,  tlie  few  good  actions  veined 
with  personal  motives  which  spoiled  the  best  of  them. 
In  the  way  of  woi'k  there  was  nothing  to  be  shown  but 
certain  books  and  other  writings,  and  these  were  spread 
out  to  be  tested.  A  fluid  was  poured  on  the  pages,  the 
effect  of  which  was  to  obliterate  entirely  every  untrue 
proposition,  and  to  make  every  partially  true  proposition 
grow  faint  in  proportion  to  the  false  element  which 
entered  into  it.  Alas  !  chapter  after  chapter  vanished 
away,  leaving  the  pa^^er  clean,  as  if  no  compositor  had 
ever  labored  in  setting  type  for  it.  Pale  and  illegible 
became  the  fine-sounding  paragraphs  on  which  I  had 
secretly  prided  myself.  A  few  passages,  however,  sur- 
vived here  and  there  at  long  intervals.     They  were  those 


A    SIDIXa    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATIOX.  50 

on  -whicli  I  had  labored  least,  and  had  almost  forgotten, 
or  those,  as  I  observed  in  one  or  two  instances,  which 
had  been  selected  for  special  reprobation  in  the  weekly 
journals.  Something  stood  to  my  credit,  and  the  worst 
charge  of  wilfnlly  and  intentionally  setting  down  what  I 
did  not  believe  to  be  true  was  not  alleged  against  me. 
Ignorance,  prejudice,  carelessness  ;  sins  of  infirmity — 
culpable  indeed,  but  not  culpable  in  the  last  degree  ;  the 
water  in  the  ink,  the  commonplaces,  the  ineffectual 
sentiments  :  these,  to  my  unspeakable  comfort,  I  per- 
ceived were  my  heaviest  crimes.  Had  I  been  accused 
of  absolute  worthlessness,  I  should  have  pleaded  guilty 
in  the  state  of  humiliation  to  which  I  was  reduced  ;  but 
things  were  better  than  they  might  have  been.  I  was 
flattering  myself  that  when  it  came  to  the  wages  ques- 
tion, the  balance  would  be  in  my  favor  :  so  many  years 
of  labor — suck  and  such  cheques  received  from  my 
publisher.  Here,  at  least,  1  held  myself  safe,  and  I  was 
in  good  hope  that  I  might  scrape  through.  The  ex- 
aminer was  good-natured  in  his  manner.  A  reviewer 
who  had  been  listening  for  ray  condemnation  was  be- 
ginning to  look  disgusted,  when  suddenly  one  of  the 
walls  of  the  court  became  transparent,  and  there  ap- 
peared an  interminable  vista  of  creatures — creatures  of 
all  kinds  from  land  and  water,  reaching  away  into  the 
extreme  distance.  They  were  those  which  in  the  course 
of  my  life  I  had  devoured,  either  in  part  or  whole,  to 
sustain  my  unconscionable  carcass.  There  they  stood  in 
lines  with  solenm  and  reproachful  faces — oxen  and 
calves,  sheep  and  lambs,  deer,  hares,  rabbits,  turkeys, 
ducks,  chickens,  pheasants,  grouse,  and  partridges,  down 
to  the  larks  and  sparrows  and  blackl)irds,  which  I  had 
shot  when  a  boy  and  made  into  puddings.  Every  one 
of   them    had  come   up   to   bear  witness   against   their 


GO  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

murderer  ;  out  of  sea  and  river  liad  come  tlie  trout  and 
salmon,  the  soles  and  turbots,  the  ling  and  cod,  the 
M'hiting  and  mackerel,  the  smelts  and  whitebait,  the 
o.jsters,  the  crabs,  the  lobsters,  the  shrimps.  They 
seemed  literally  to  be  in  millions,  and  I  had  eaten  them 
all.  I  talked  of  wages.  These  had  been  my  wages. 
At  this  enormous  cost  had  my  existence  been  main- 
tained. A  stag  spoke  for  the  rest.  "  We  all,"  he  said, 
"  were  sacrificed  to  keep  this  cormorant  in  being,  and  to 
enable  him  to  produce  the  miserable  bits  of  printed 
paper  which  are  all  that  he  has  to  show  for  himself. 
Our  lives  were  dear  to  us.  In  meadow  and  wood,  in  air 
and  water,  we  wandered  harmless  and  innocent,  enjoy- 
ing the  pleasant  sunlight,  the  light  of  heaven  and  the 
sparkling  waves  ;  we  were  not  worth  much  ;  we  have 
no  pretensions  to  high  qualities.  If  the  person  who 
stands  here  to  answer  for  himself  can  afiirm  that  his 
value  in  the  universe  was  equivalent  to  the  value  of  all 
of  us  who  were  sacrificed  to  feed  him,  we  have  no  more 
to  say.  Let  it  be  so  pronounced.  We  shall  look  at  our 
numbers,  and  we  shall  wonder  at  the  judgment,  though 
we  shall  withdraw  our  complaint.  But  for  ourselves  we 
say  freely  that  we  have  long  watched  him — him  and  his 
fellows — and  we  have  failed  to  see  in  w^hat  the  superior- 
ity of  the  human  creature  lies.  We  know  him  only  as 
the  most  cunning,  the  most  destructive,  and,  unhappily, 
the  longest  lived  of  all  carnivorous  beasts.  His  dehght 
is  in  killing.  Even  when  his  hunger  is  satisfied  he  kills 
us  for  his  mere  amusement." 

The  oxen  lowed  approval,  the  sheep  bleated,  the  birds 
screamed,  the  fishes  flapped  their  tails.  I,  for  myself, 
stood  mute  and  self-condemned.  What  answer  but  one 
was  possible  ?  Had  I  been  myself  on  the  bench  I  could 
not  have  hesitated.     The  fatal  sentence  of  condemnation 


A    SIDING    AT    A    RAILWAY    STATION".  fil 

was  evidently  about  to  be  uttered,  when  the  scene 
became  indistinct,  there  was  a  confused  noise,  a  change 
of  condition,  a  sound  of  running  feet  and  of  many 
voices.  I  awoke  ;  I  was  again  in  the  railway  carriage  ; 
the  door  was  thrown  open  ;  porters  entered  to  take  our 
things.  We  stepped  out  upon  the  platform.  We  were 
at  the  terminus  for  w^hich  we  had  been  originally 
dt'stined.  Carriages  and  cabs  were  waiting  ;  tall  pow- 
dered footmen"  flew  to  the  assistance  of  the  duke  and 
duchess.  The  station-master  was  standing  hat  in  hand, 
ajid  obsequiously  bowing  ;  the  minister's  private  sec- 
retary had  come  to  meet  his  right  honorable  chief  with 
the  red  despatch-box,  knowing  the  impatience  with 
which  it  w^as  waited  for.  The  duke  shook  hands  with 
fh^  archbishop  before  he  drove  away.  "  Dine  with  us 
to-morrow?"  he  said.  "I  have  had  a  very  singular 
dream.  Yoif  shall  be  my  Daniel  and  interpret  it  for 
me.^'  The  archbishop  regretted  infinitely  that  he  must 
deny  himself  the  honor  ;  his  presence  was  required  at 
the  Conference.  "  I,  too,  have  dreamt,"  he  said  ;  "  but 
with  your  Grace  and  me  the  realities  of  this  world  are 
too  serious  to  leave  us  leisure  for  the  freaks  of  imagina- 
tion." 


II. 

THE  NORWAY   FJORDS. 

On  June  SOtli,  1881,  we  sailed  from  Southampton 
Water  in  a  steam  yacht  to  spend  ten  weeks  in  the  Norway 
fjords — fjords  or  friths,  for  the  word  is  the  same.  The 
Scandinavian  children  of  the  sea  carried  their  favorite 
names  with  them.  Frith  is  fjord  ;  our  Cumberland 
Scale  Force  would  be  called  Scale  Foss  between  the 
North  Cape  and  the  Baltic.  The  yacht  was  spacious  ; 
over  three  hundred  tons.  Cabins,  equipments,  engines, 
captain,  steward,  crew,  the  best  of  their  kind.  Our 
party  was  small  :  only  four  in  all.       My  friend  whose 

guest  I  was,  and  whom  I  shall  call  X ,  two  ladies, 

and  myself.     X had  furnished  himself  with  such 

knowledge  as  was  attainable  in  London,  for  the  scenes 
which  we  were  to  explore.  He  had  studied  Norse. 
He  could  speak  it  ;  he  could  understand  and  be  under- 
stood. He  was  a  sportsman,  but  a  sportsman  only  as 
subsidiary  to  more  rational  occupations.  He  was  going 
to  Norway  to  catch  salmonidae  :  not,  however,  to  catch 
them  only,  but  to  study  the  varieties  of  that  most  com- 
plicated order  of  iisli.  He  was  going  also  to  geologize 
and  to  botanize,  to  examine  rocks  and  rivers  and  glaciers 
and  flowers  ;  while  all  of  us  were  meaning  to  acquaint 
ourselves  as  far  as  we  could  with  the  human  specimens 
still  to  be  found  in  the  crater  of  the  old  volcano  fi'om 
which  those  shiploads  of  murdering  "  Danes"  poured 
out  ten  centuries  ago  to  change  the  face  of  Europe. 


THE    XOKWAY    FJORDS.  63 

And  to  see  Norway,  the  real  Norway,  within  moderate 
compass  of  time  is  possible  only  with  such  means  as  a 
steam  yacht  provides.  There  are  great  lines  of  road  in 
Norway  along  the  practicable  routes,  but  very  few  are 
practicable  ;  nine  tenths  of  the  country,  and  the  most 
interesting  parts,  are  so  walled  off  by  mountains,  are  so 
intrenched  among  the  fjords,  as  to  be  forever  unap- 
proajchable  by  land,  while  the  water  highways  lead 
ever}"where — magnificent  canals,  fashioned  by  the  ele- 
mental forces,  who  can  say  how  or  when  ? 

From  the  west  coast  there  run  inland  with  a  general 
easterly  direction  ten  or  twelve  main  channels  of  sea, 
penetrating  from  fifty  to  a  hundred  miles  into  the  very 
heart  of  tlie  northern  peninsula.  They  are  of  vast 
depth,  and  from  half  a  mile  to  two  miles  broad.  The 
mountains  rise  on  both  sides  sheer  from  the  water's 
edge,  the  loANicr  ranges  densely  timbered  with  pine 
and  birch  and  alder  ;  above  these  belts  of  forest  soar 
ranges  of  lofty  peaks,  five  or  six  thousand  feet  up,  the 
snow  lying  thick  upon  them  in  the  midst  of  summer, 
glaciers  oozing  down  the  gorges,  like  cataracts  arrested  in 
their  fall  l)y  the  frost  enchanter,  motionless,  yet  with 
the  form  of  motion.  From  the  snow,  from  the  ice 
wliei)  the  glaciers  reacli  a  warmer  level,  melt  streams 
which  swell  at  noon,  as  the  sun  grows  hot,  descend  in 
never-ending  waterfalls,  cascade  upon  cascade,  througli 
tlie  ravines  which  they  have  cut  for  themselves  in 
millions  of  years.  In  the  evening  they  dwindle  away, 
and  at  night  fall  silent  as  the  frost  resumes  its  power. 

From  the  great  central  fjords  l)ranches  strike  out  right 
and  left,  some  mere  inlets  ending  after  a  few  miles,  some 
fhannels  which  connect  one  fjord  with  another.  The 
surface  of  Norway,  as  it  is  shown  Hat  upon  a  chart,  is 
lined  and  intersected  by  these  water-ways  as  the  surface 


64  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

of  England  is  by  railways.  The  scenery,  though  forevei 
changing,  changes  like  the  pattern  of  a  kaleidoscope,  the 
same  materials  readjusted  in  varying  combinations  ;  the 
same  rivers  of  sea- water,  the  same  mountain  walls,  the 
same  ice  and  snow  on  the  summits,  the  same  never- 
ending  pines  and  birches,  with  an  emerald  carpet 
l>etween  the  stems  where  the  universal  whortleberry 
hides  the  stones  under  the  most  brilliant  green.  The 
short  fjords  and  the  large  are  identical  in  general 
features,  save  that,  lying  at  right  angles  to  the  prevailing 
winds,  the  surface  of  these  lateral  waters  is  usually  un- 
disturbed by  a  single  ripple  ;  the  clouds  may  be  racing 
over  the  high  ridges,  but  down  below  no  breath  can 
reach.  Hence  the  light  is  undispersed.  The  eye, 
instead  of  meeting  anywhere  with  white  water,  sees 
only  rocks,;woods,  and  cataracts  reversed  as  in  a  looking- 
glass.  This  extreme  stillness,  and  the  optical  results  of 
it,  are  the  cause,  I  suppose,  of  the  gloom  of  JS^orwegian 
landscape- j)ainting. 

How  these  fjords  were  formed  is,  I  believe,  as  yet 
undetermined.  Water  has  furrowed  the  surface  of  the 
globe  into  many  a  singular  shape  ;  water,  we  are  told, 
cut  out  the  long  gorge  below  Niagara  ;  but  water,  acting 
as  we  now  know  it,  scarcely  scooj^ed  out  of  the  hardest 
known  rock  these  multitudinous  fissures  so  uniform  in 
character  between  walls  which  pierce  the  higher  strata 
of  the  clouds,  between  cliffs  which  in  some  places  rise, 
as  in  the  Geiranger,  perpendicular  for  a  thousand  feet  ; 
the  fjords  themselves  of  such  extraoi'dinary  depth,  and 
deepest  always  when  furthest  from  the  sea.  Where 
they  enter  the  Atlantic,  there  is  bottom  generally  in  a 
hundred  fathoms.  In  the  Sogne,  a  hundred  miles 
inland,  you  find  seven  hundred  fathoms.  Rivers  cut- 
ting their  way  through  rock  and  soil  could  never  have 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS.  65 

achieved  such  work  as  this.  Ice  is  a  mighty  thaiimatur- 
gist,  and  ice  has  been  busy  enough  in  Norway.  The 
fjords  were  once  filled  with  ice  up  to  a  certain  level  ; 
the  level  to  which  it  rose  can  be  traced  on  the  sharp 
angles  ground  off  the  rounded  stone,  and  the  scores  of 
the  glacier  plane  on  the  polished  slabs  of  gneiss  or 
granite.  But  at  some  hundreds  of  feet  above  the 
pre^-ent  water-line  the  ice  action  ends,  and  cliffs  and 
crags  are  scarred  and  angular  and  weather-splintered  to 
where  they  are  lost  in  the  eternal  snow.  The  vast 
moraines  which  occasionally  block  the  valleys  tell  the 
same  story.  The  largest  that  I  saw  was  between  four  and 
five  hundred  feet  high,  and  we  have  to  account  for 
chasms  which,  if  we  add  the  depth  of  the  water  to  the 
height  of  the  mountains  above  it,  are  nine  thousand  feet 
frr-m  the  bottom  to  the  mountain  crest. 

The  appeara*ice  of  Korway  is  precisely  what  it  would 
have  been  if  the  surface  had  cracked  when  cooling  into 
a  thousand  fissures,  longitudinal  and  diagonal,  if  these 
fissures  had  at  one  time  been  filled  with  sea-water,  at 
another  with  ice,  and  the  sides  above  the  point  to  which 
the  ice  could  rise  had  been  chipped  and  torn  and 
weather-worn  by  rain  and  frost  through  endless  ages. 
Whether  this  is,  in  fact,  the  explanation  of  their  form, 
philosophers  will  in  good  time  assure  themselves  ;  mean- 
time, this  is  what  they  are  outwardly  like,  which  for 
present  purposes  is  all  that  need  be  required. 

A  country  so  organized  can  be  traversed  in  no  way  so 
conveniently  as  by  a  steam  yacht,  which  carries  the  four- 
and-twenty  winds  in  its  boiler.  It  is  not  the  romance  of 
yachting  ;  and  the  steamer,  beside  the  graceful  schooner 
with  its  snowy  canvas,  seems  prosaic  and  mechanical. 
The  schooner  does  well  in  the  open  water  with  free  air 
and  sea  room  ;  but   let    no  schooner  venture   into  the 


66  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FKOUDE. 

Norway  fjords,  where  slant  winds  come  not  by  which 
you  can  make  a  course  by  a  long  reach,  where  there  is 
either  a  glassy  calm  or  a  wind  blowing  up  or  down.  If 
you  reached  the  end  of  the  Sogne  yon  might  spend  a 
season  in  beating  back  to  the  sea  alone,  and,  except  in 
some  few  spots  where  you  might  not  be  able  to  go,  you 
cannot  so  much  as  anchor  for  the  depth  of  water.  Shut 
in  among  these  mountains,  you  may  drift,  becalmed  in 
a  sailing  yacht  for  weeks  together,  while  to  a  steamer 
the  course  is  as  easy  and  sure  as  to  a  carriage  on  a  turn- 
pike road.  Your  yacht  is  your  house,  and  like  a  wishing 
carpet,  it  transports  you  wherever  you  please  to  go,  and 
is  here  and  there  and  anywhere.  You  note  your  posi- 
tion on  the  chart  ;  you  scan  it  with  the  sense  that  the 
world  of  Norway  is  all  before  you  to  go  where  you  like  ; 
you  choose  your  next  anchoring-place  ;  you  point  it  out 
to  the  pilot  ;  you  know  your  speed — there  is  no  night 
in  the  summer  months — you  dine  ;  you  smoke  your 
evening  cigar  ;  you  go  to  your  berth  ;  you  find  yourself 
at  breakfast  in  your  new  surroundings. 

So  then,  on  that  June  evening,  we  steamed  out  of  the 
Solent.  Our  speed  in  smooth  water  was  ten  knots  ;  our 
distance  from  Udsire  light,  for  which  our  course  was 
laid,  was  seven  hundred  miles.  It  was  calm  and  cloud- 
less, but  unusually  cold.  When  night  brought  the  stars 
we  saw  the  comet  high  above  us,  the  tail  of  him  point- 
ing straight  away  from  the  sun,  as  if  the  head  was  a 
lens  through  which  the  sun^s  rays  lighted  the  atoms  of 
ether  behind  it.  Sleep,  which  had  grown  fitful  in  the 
London  season,  came  back  to  us  at  once  in  our  berths 
unscared  by  the  grinding  of  the  screw.  We  woke  fi'esh 
and  elastic  when  the  decks  were  washed.  The  floors  of 
the  cabins  lifted  on  hinges,  and  below  were  baths  into 
which  the  sea-water  poured  till  we   could  float  in   it. 


THE    NORWAY    TJORUS.  67 

"When  we  came  up  and  looked  about  us  we  were  running 
past  the  North  Forehmd.  With  the  wind  aft  and  the 
water  smooth  we  sped  on.  I  lay  all  the  morning  on  a 
sofa  in  the  deck  cabin,  and  smoked  and  read  Xenophon's 
"  Memorabilia."  So  one  daj  passed,  and  then  another. 
On  the  evening  of  July  2d  we  passed  through  a  fleet  of 
English  trawlers,  a  few  units  of  the  ten  thousand 
feeders  of  the  London  stomach,  the  four  million  human 
beings  within  the  bills  of  mortality  whom  the  world 
combines  to  nourish.  We  were  doino-  two  hundred 
miles  a  day.  The  calm  continued,  aiul  the  ladies  so  far 
had  suffered  nothing.  There  was  no  motion  save  the 
never-resting  heave  of  the  ocean  swell.  Homer  had 
observed  that  long  undulation  ;  Ulysses  felt  it  when 
coming  back  from  Hades  to  Circe's  island.  The  thing 
is  the  same,  though  the  word  ocean  has  changd  its 
meaning.  To  ilomer  ocean  was  a  river  which  ran  ]xist 
the  grove  of  Proserpine.  It  was  not  till  the  ship  had 
left  the  river  mouth  for  the  open  sea  that  she  lifted  on 
the  wave.* 

On  the  third  afternoon  the  weather  changed.  The 
cold  of  the  high  latitude  drove  us  into  our  winter 
clothes.  The  wind  rose  from  the  north-west,  bringing 
thick  rain  with  it,  and  a  heavy  beam  sea.  The  yacht 
rolled  twenty  degrees  each  way.  Long  steamers,  with- 
out sails  to  steady  them,  always  do  roll,  but  our  speed 
was  not  altered.  We  passed  lldsire  light  on  the  3d,  at 
seven  in  the  evening,  and  then  groped  our  way  slowly, 
for,  though  there  was  no  longer  any  night,  we  could  see 
little  for  fog  and  mist.  At  last  we  picked  up  a  pilot 
who  brought  us  safely  into  the  roadstead  at   Bergen, 

*  KvTap  knti  norafioio  "klnev  (i6ov  'QKcnvolo 
N»/uf,  and  d'  Uero  avfja  QaXfiaaiji  evfjVKdfjoio. 

Odjasvij,  xii.  1,  'i. 


68  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   jl.   FROUDB. 

where  we  were  to  begin  our  acquaintance  with  Norway. 
It  stands  fifteen  miles  inland,  with  three  fjords  leading 
to  it,  built  on  a  long  tongue  of  rock  between  two  inlets, 
and  overhung  with  mountains.  There  is  a  great  trade 
there,  chiefly  in  salt  fish,  I  believe — any  way  the  forty 
thousand  inhabitants  seemed,  from  the  stir  on  shore  and 
in  the  harbor,  to  have  plenty  to  occupy  them.  We 
landed  and  walked  round.  There  are  no  handsome 
houses,  but  no  beggars  and  no  signs  of  poverty.  "  You 
have  poor  here,"  I  said  to  a  coal  merchant,  who  came 
on  board  for  orders,  and  could  speak  English.  "  Poor  ?" 
he  said  ;  "  yes,  many  ;  not,  of  course,  such  poor  as  you 
have  in  England.  Everyone  has  enough  to  eat."  To 
our  sensations  it  was  extremely  cold — cold  as  an  English 
January.  But  cold  and  heat  are  relative  terms  ;  and  an 
English  January  might  seem  like  summer  after  Arctic 
winters.  The  Bergen  people  took  it  to  be  summer,  for 
we  found  a  public  garden  where  a  band  played  ;  and 
there  were  chairs  and  tables  for  coffee  out  of  doors. 
Trees  and  shrubs  were  acclimatized.  Lilacs,  acacias, 
and  horse-chestnuts  were  in  flower.  There  were  roses  in 
bud,  and  the  gardeners  were  planting  out  geraniums. 
We  saw  the  fish  market  ;  everywhere  a  curious  place, 
for  you  see  there  the  fish  that  are  caught,  the  fishermen 
who  catch  them,  with  their  boats  and  gear,  the  market- 
women,  and  the  citizens  who  come  to  buy.  It  is  all  fish 
in  Bergen.  The  teleg-rams  on  the  wall  in  the  Bourse 
tell  you  only  how  fish  are  going  in  Holland  and  Den- 
mark. The  trade  is  in  fish.  On  the  rocks  outside  the 
town  stand  huge  stacks,  looking  like  bean-stacks,  but  they 
are  of  dried  cod  and  ling.  The  streets  and  squares 
smell  of  fish.  A  steamer  bound  for  Hull  lay  close  to 
us  in  the  roadstead,  which  to  leeward  might  have  been 
winded  for  a  mile.     Lads  stagger  about  the  streets  cased 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS,  69 

between  a  pair  of  halibuts,  like  the  Chelsea  paupers 
between  two  advertisement  boards  inviting  us  to  vote 
or  Sir  Charles  Dilke  at  an  election.  Still,  excepting 
the  odors,  we  liked  Bergen  well.  You  never  hear  the 
mendicant  whine  there.  Those  northern  people  know 
how  to  work  and  take  care  of  themselves,  and  loafers 
can  find  no  living  among  them,  1  do  not  know  whether 
the}»p  is  so  much  as  a  beggar  in  the  whole  town.  Thej 
are  quiet,  simple,  industrious  folk,  who  mind  their  o"«ti 
business.  For  politics  they  care  nothing,  not  supposing 
that  on  this  road  is  any  kind  of  salvation  for  them.  They 
are  Lutherans,  universally  Lutherans.  It  is  the  national 
religion,  and  they  are  entirely  satisfied  with  it.  Prot- 
estant dissent  is  never  heard  of.  There  is  a  Catholic 
church  in  Bergen  for  the  foreign  sailors,  but  1  doubt  if 
the  priests  have  converted  a  single  Norwegian.  They 
are  a  people  already  moderately  well-to-do  in  body  and 
mind,  and  do  not  need  anything  which  the  priests  could 
give  them.  The  intellectual  essentials  are  well  looked 
after — the  schools  are  good,  and  well  attended.  The 
Bergen  museum  is  a  model  on  a  small  scale  of  what  a 
local  museum  ought  to  be,  an  epitome  of  Norway  itself 
past  and  present,  Perliaps  there  is  not  another  in 
Europe  so  excellent  of  its  kind.  In  the  gallery  of 
antiquities  there  is  the  Norway  of  the  sea-kings.  Runic 
tablets  and  inscriptions,  chain  armor,  swords,  and  clubs, 
and  battleaxes,  pots  of  earthenware,  stone  knives  and 
hammers  of  a  still  earlier  age.  There  are  the  traces  of 
their  marauding  expeditions,  Greek  and  Italian  statu- 
ettes, rings,  chains,  bracelets,  and  drinking-cups,  one  or 
two  of  these  last  especially  curious,  for  glass  was  rare 
and  precious  wdien  they  were  made.  The  glass  has  been 
broken,  and  pieced  with  silver.  These  obviously  were 
the  spoils  of  some  cruise  in  the  Mediterranean,  and  thero 


70  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

is  old  clmrcli  plate  among  tlieni  which  also  tells  its 
stoiy.  By  the  side  of  these  are  the  implements  of  the 
Norseman's  other  trade — fishing  :  specimens  of  nets, 
lines,  hooks,  spears,  and  harpoons,  for  whale  and  walrus, 
and  crossbows,  the  barbed  arrow  having  a  line  attached 
to  it  for  shooting  seals.  In  the  galleries  above  is  a  very 
comj)lete  collection  of  the  Scandinavian  mammalia — 
wolves,  bears,  lynxes,  foxes,  whales,  seals,  and  sea- 
horses, every  kind  of  fish,  every  bird,  land  or  water,  all 
perfectly  well  classified,  labelled,  and  looked  after, 
Superior  persons  are  in  charge  of  it,  who  can  hold  their 
own  with  leading  naturalists  of  France  or  England  ;  and 
all  this  is  maintained  at  modest  cost  by  the  Bergen 
corporation. 

The  houses  are  plain  but  clean  ;  no  dirt  is  visible 
anywhere,  and  there  is  one  sure  sign  of  a  desire  to  make 
life  graceful.  The  hardiest  flowers  only  will  grow  out 
of  doors,  but  half  the  windows  in  the  towni  are  filled 
with  myrtles,  geraniums,  or  carnations.  With  the 
people  themselves  we  had  little  opportunity  of  acquaint- 
ance ;  but  one  evening,  the  second  after  our  arrival,  we 
were  on  deck  after  dinner  between  ten  and  eleven  in  the 
evening.  The  sunshine  was  still  on  the  hills.  Though 
chilly  to  us,  the  air  was  warm  to  Bergen  ;  the  bay  was 
covered  with  boats  ;  family  groups  of  citizens  out  enjoy- 
ing tiiemselves  ;  music  floating  on  the  water  and  songs 
made  sweet  by  distance  ;  others  were  anchored  fishing. 

X rowed  me  out  in  the  yacht's  punt  to  a  point  half 

a  mile  distant.  We  brought  up  at  an  oar's  length  from 
some  young  ladies  with  a  youth  in  charge  of  them. 
Some  question  asked  as  an  excuse  for  conversation  was 
politely  answered.  One  of  them  spoke  excellent  Eng- 
lish ;  she  was  a  lively,  clever  girl,  had  been  in  Ireland, 
and  was   quick  with   repartee,  well   bred   and  refined 


THE   lirORWAY    FJ0KD3.  71 

Their  manners  were  faultless,  but  they  fished  as  if  thej 
had  been  bred  to  the  trade.  Tliey  had  oilskin  aprons  to 
save  their  dresses,  and  they  pulled  up  their  fish  and 
handled  their  knives  and  baits  like  professionals. 

Our  first  taste  of  i^orway,  notwithstanding  the  perfume 
of  salt  ling,  was  very  pleasant  ;  but  we  had  far  to  go — 
as  far  as  Lofoden  if  we  could  manage  it — and  we  might 
no*;  loiter.  "VVe  left  Bergen  on  the  Gth  with  a  local 
pilot.  Trondhjem  or  Drontheim  was  the  next  point 
where  we  were  to  expect  letters,  and  two  courses  lead  to 
it—teither  by  the  open  sea  outside  the  shoals  and  islands, 
or  inland  by  the  network  of  fjords,  longei"  but  infinitely 
the  most  interesting,  with  the  further  merit  of  water 
perfectly  smooth.  We  started  at  six  in  the  morning  and 
fley  on  rapidly  among  tortuous  channels,  now  sweeping 
through  a  passage  scarcely  wider  than  the  yacht's  length, 
now  bursting •♦nto  an  archipelago  of  islets.  The  western 
coast  of  Norway  is  low  and  level — a  barren,  undulating 
country,  with  the  sea  flowing  freely  through  the  hollows. 
Here  and  there  are  green  patches  of  meadow  with  a  few 
trees,  where  there  woiild  be  a  bonder's  or  yeoman's 
farm.  Prettily  painted  lighthouses  with  their  red  roofs 
marked  our  course  for  us,  and  a  girl  or  two  would  come 
out  upon  the  balconies  to  look  at  us  as  we  rushed  by 
within  a  gunshot.  Eider-ducks  flashed  out  of  the  water, 
the  father  of  the  family  as  usual  the  first  to  fly,  and 
leaving  wife  and  children  to  take  care  of  themselves. 
Fishing-boats  crossed  us  at  intervals,  and  now  and  then 
a  whale  spouted  :  other  signs  of  life  there  were  none. 
Toward  midday  we  entered  the  Sogne  Fjord  ;  we  turned 
eastward  toward  the  great  mountain  ranges  ;  and,  as  in 
the  fairy  tale  the  rock  opens  to  tlie  enchanted  prince, 
and  he  finds  himself  amid  gardens  and  palaces,  so,  as  we 
ran  on  seemingly  upon  an  impenetrable  wall,  cliff  and 


72  SKETCHES    FROM   J.  A.   FROUDE. 

crag  fell  apart,  and  wc  entered  on  what  might  be  de- 
scribed as  an  infinite  extension  of  Loch  Lomond,  save 
only  that  the  mountains  were  far  grander,  the  slopes 
more  densely  wooded,  and  that,  far  uj),  we  were  looking 
on  the  everlasting  snow,  or  the  gi'een  glitter  of  the 
glaciers. 

On  either  side  of  us,  as  we  steamed  on,  we  crossed  the 
mouths  of  other  fjords,  lateral  branches  precisely  like 
the  parent  trunk,  penetrating,  as  we  could  see  upon  oui 
chart,  for  tens  of  miles.  Norse  history  grew  intelligible 
as  we  looked  at  them.  Here  were  the  hiding-places 
where  the  vikings,  wickelings,  hole-and-corner  pirates, 
ran  in  with  their  spoils  ;  and  here  was  the  explanation 
of  their  roving  lives.  The  few  spots  where  a  family 
could  sustain  itself  on  the  soil  are  scattered  at  intervals 
of  leagues.  The  woods  are  silent  and  desolate  ;  wild 
animals  of  any  kind  we  never  saw  ;  hunting  there  could 
have  been  none.  The  bears  have  increased  since  the 
farming  introduced  sheep  ;  but  a  thousand  years  ago, 
save  a  few  reindeer  and  a  few  grouse  and  ptarmigan, 
there  was  nothing  which  would  feed  either  bear  or  man. 
Few  warm-blooded  creatures,  furred  or  feathered,  can 
endure  the  w^inter  cold.  A  population  cannot  live  by 
fish  alone,  and  thus  the  Norsemen  became  rovers  by 
necessity,  and  when  summer  came  they  formed  in  fleets 
and  went  south  to  seek  their  sustenance.  The  pine 
forests  were  their  arsenal  ;  their  vessels  were  the  best 
and  fastest  in  the  world  ;  the  water  was  their  only 
road  ;  they  were  boatmen  and  seamen  by  second  nature, 
and  the  seacoasts  within  reach  of  a  summer  outing  were 
their  natural  prey. 

We  were  looking  for  an  anchoring-place  where  there  was 
a  likelihood  of  fishing  ;  we  had  seen  an  inlet  on  the  chart, 
turning  out  of  the  Sogne,  which  looked  promising.    At  the 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS.  73 

upper  end  two  rivers  appeared  to  run  into  it  out  of  fresh 
water  lakes  close  by  ;  conditions  likely  to  yield  salmon.  It 
was  our  first  experiment,  A  chart  is  flat.  Imagination, 
unenlightened  by  experience,  had  pictured  tlie  fjord 
ending  in  level  meadows,  manageable  streams  winding 
through  them,  and,  beyond,  perhaps,  some  Rydal  or 
Grasmere  lying  tranquil  among  its  hills.  The  pilot  said 
that  he  knew  the  place,  but  could  give  us  no  description 
of  it.  Anticipation  generally  makes  mistakes  on  such 
occasions,  but  never  were  fact  and  fancy  more  startlingly 
at  variance.  Lord  Salisbury  advised  people  to  study 
geography  on  large  maps.  Flat  charts  are  more  con- 
venient than  models  of  a  country  in  relief,  but  they  are 
treacherous  misleaders.  Grand  as  the  Sogne  had  been, 
the  inlet  where  we  struck  into  it  was  a-rander  still.  The 
forests  on  the  shores  were  denser,  the  slopes  steeper,  the 
cliffs  and  peaks  soaring  up  in  more  stupendous  majesty. 
"We  ran  on  thus  for  eight  or  ten  miles  ;  then,  turning 
round  a  projecting  spui",  we  found  ourselves  in  a  land- 
locked estuary  smooth  as  a  mirror,  the  mountains  on 
one  side  of  it  beautiful  in  evening  sunlight,  on  the  other 
darkening  the  water  with  their  green  purple  shadows  ; 
at  the  far  extremity,  which  was  still  five  miles  from  us, 
a  broad  white  line  showed,  instead  of  our  "meadow 
stream,"  where  a  mighty  torrent  was  pouring  in  a 
cataract  over  the  face  of  a  precipice  into  the  sea. 

At  the  foot  of  this  fall,  not  three  hundred  yards  from 
it  (no  bottom  was  to  be  found  at  a  greater  distance),  we 
anchored  half  an  hour  later,  and  looked  about  us.  We 
were  in  the  heart  of  a  primitive  Norwegian  valley, 
buried  among  mountains  so  lofty  and  so  unbroken  that 
no  road  had  ever  entered,  or  could  enter  it.  It  was  the 
first  of  many  which  we  saw  afterward  of  the  same  type, 
and  one  description  will  serve  for  all. 


74  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

We  Avere  in  a  circular  basin  at  the  head  of  a  fjord. 
In  front  of  us  was  a  river  as  large  as  the  Clyde  rushing 
out  of  a  chasm  a  thousand  feet  above  us,  and  plunging 
down  in  boiling  foam.  Above  this  chasm  and  inacces- 
sible, was  one  of  the  lakes  which  we  had  seen  on  the 
chart,  and  in  which  we  had  expected  to  catch  salmon. 
The  mountains  round  were,  as  usual,  covered  with  wood. 
At  the  foot  of  the  fall,  and  worked  by  part  of  it,  was  a 
large  saw-mill  with  its  adjoining  sheds  and  buildings. 
The  pines  were  cut  as  they  were  wanted,  floated  to  the 
mill  and  made  into  planks,  vessels  coming  at  intervals  to 
take  them  away.  The  Norwegians  are  accused  of  wast- 
ing their  forests  with  these  mills.  We  could  see  no 
signs  of  it.  In  the  first  place,  the  sides  of  the  fjords 
are  so  steep  that  the  trees  can  be  got  at  only  in  com- 
paratively few  places.  When  they  can  be  got  at,  there 
is  no  excessive  destruction  ;  more  pines  are  annually 
swept  away  by  avalanches  than  are  consumed  by  all  the 
mills  in  ]S"orway  ;  and  the  quantity  is  so  enormous  that 
the  amount  which  men  can  use  is  no  more  likely  to 
exhaust  it  than  the  Loch  Fyne  fishermen  are  likely  to 
exhaust  the  herring  shoals. 

On  the  other  side  of  the  basin  where  we  lay  was  the 
domain  of  the  owner  of  the  mill.  Though  the  fjord 
ended,  the  great  ravine  in  which  it  was  formed  stretched, 
as  we  could  see,  a  couple  of  miles  further,  but  it  had  been 
blocked  by  a  moraine  which  stretched  across  it.  The 
moraines,  being  formed  of  loose  soil  and  stones  deposited 
by  ice  in  the  glacial  period,  are  available  for  cultivation 
and  are  indeed  excellent  land.  There  were  forty  or  fifty 
acres  of  grass  laid  up  for  hay,  a  few  acres  of  potatoes,  a 
red-roofed,  sunny  farmhouse  with  large  outbuildings,  carts 
and  horses  moving  about,  poultry  crowing,  cattle  grazing, 
a  boat-house  and  platform  where  a  couple  of  lighters  were 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS.  75 

unloading.  Here  was  the  house  of  a  substantial,  pros- 
perous bonder.  His  nearest  neighbor  must  have  been 
twelve  miles  from  him.  He,  his  children,  and  farm- 
servants  were  the  sole  occupants  of  the  valley.  The  saw- 
mill was  theirs  ;  the  boats  were  theirs  ;  their  own  hands 
supplied  everything  which  they  wanted.  They  were 
their  own  carpenters,  smiths,  masons,  and  glaziers  ;  they 
sheared  their  own  sheep,  spun  and  dyed  their  own  wool, 
wove  their  own  cloth,  and  cut  and  sewed  their  own 
dresses.  It  was  a  true  specimen  of  primitive  Norwegian 
life  complete  in  itself — of  j)eaceful,  quiet,  self-sufficient, 
prosperous  industry. 

The  snake  that  spoiled  Paradise  had  doubtless  found 
its  way  into  Nord  Gulen  (so  our  valley  was  named)  as 
in,to  other  places,  but  a  softer,  sweeter-looking  spot  we 
had  none  of  us  ever  seen.  It  was  seven  in  the  evening 
when  we  anchored  ;  a  skiff  came  off,  rowed  by  a  couple 
of  plain,  stout  girls  with  offers  of  eggs  and  milk. 
Fishing-lines  were  brought  out  as  soon  as  the  anchor  was 
down.  The  surface  water  was  fresh,  and  icy  cold  as 
coming  out  of  the  near  glaciers  ;  but  it  was  salt  a  few 
fathoms  down,  and  almost  immediately  we  had  a  basket 
of  dabs  and  whiting. 

After   dinner,    at   nine    o'clock,    with   the    sun   still 

shining,  X and  I  went  ashore  wath  our  trout-rods. 

We  climbed  the  moraine,  and  a  narrow  lake  lay  spread 
out  before  us,  perfectly  still,  the  sides  steep,  in  many 
places  precipitous,  trees  growing  wherever  a  root  could 
strike.  The  lake  was  three  miles  long,  and  seemed  to 
end  against  the  foot  of  a  range  of  mountains  five 
thousand  feet  high,  the  peaks  of  which,  thickly  covered 
with  snow,  were  flushed  with  the  crimson  light  of  the 
evening.  The  surface  of  the  water  was  spotted  with 
rings  where  the  trout  were  rising.     One  of  the  bonder's 


76  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

bojs,  who  had  followed  us,  offered  his  boat.  It  was  of 
native  maniifacture,  and  not  particularly  water-tight,  but 
we  stowed  ourselves,  one  in  the  bow  and  the  other  in 
the  stern.  The  boy  had  never  seen  such  rods  as  ours  ; 
he  looked  incredulously  at  them,  and  still  more  at  our 
flies  ;  Ijut  he  rowed  us  to  the  top  of  the  lake,  where  a 
river  came  down  out  of  the  snow-mountain,  finishing  its 
descent  with  a  leap  over  a  cliff.  Here  he  told  us  there 
were  trout  if  we  could  catch  them  ;  and  he  took  us 
deliberately  into  the  spray  of  the  waterfall,  not  under- 
standing, till  we  were  nearly  wet  through,  that  we  had 
any  objection  to  it.  As  the  evening  went  on  the  scene 
became  every  minute  grander  and  more  glorious.  The 
sunset  colors  deepened  ;  a  crag  just  over  us,  two  thou- 
sand feet  high,  'stood  out  clear  and  sharp  against  the 
sky.  We  stayed  for  two  or  three  hours,  idly  throwing 
out  flies  and  catching  a  few  trout  no  longer  than  our 
hands,  thereby  confirming  evidently  our  friend's  impres- 
sion of  our  inefficiency.  At  midnight  we  were  in  the 
yacht  again — midnight,  and  it  was  like  a  night  in  Eng- 
land at  the  end  of  June  five  minutes  after  sunset. 

This  was  our  first  experience  of  a  Norway  fjord,  and 
for  myself  I  would  have  been  content  to  go  no  further  ; 
have  studied  in  detail  the  exquisite  beauty  which  was 
round  us  ;  have  made  friends  with  the  bonder  and  his 
household,  and  found  out  what  they  made  of  their 
existence  under  such  conditions.  There  in  epitome 
would  have  been  seeing  !N^orway  and  the  Norwegians. 
It  was  no  Arcadia  of  piping  shepherds.  In  the  summer 
the  young  men  are  away  at  the  mountain  farms,  high 
grazing-ground  underneath  the  snow-line.  The  women 
work  with  their  brothers  and  husbands,  and  weave  and 
make  the  clothes.  They  dress  plainly,  but  with  good 
taste,  with  modest  embroidery  ;  a  handsome  bag  hangs 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS.  77 

at  the  waist  of  tlie  housewife.  There  is  reading,  ftoo, 
and  schohirship.  A  boy  met  tis  on  a  pathway,  and 
spoke  to  us  in  Englisli.  "We  asked  him  when  he  had 
been  in  England.  He  had  never  been  beyond  his  own 
valley  ;  in  the  long  winter  evenings  he  had  taught  him- 
self with  an  English  grammar.  Ko  wonder  that  with 
such  ready  adaptabilities  they  made  the  best  of  emi- 
gKants.  The  overflow  of  population  which  once  directed 
itself  in  such  rude  fashion  on  I^ormandy  and  England 
now  finds  its  way  to  the  United  States,  and  no  incomers 
are^  more  welcome  there. 

But  a  steam  yacht  is  for  movement  and  change.  We 
were  to  start  again  at  noon  the  next  day.  The  morning 
was  hot  and  bright.  While  the  engineer  was  getting  up 
Bteain,  we  rowed  to  the  foot  of  the  great  fall.  I  had 
my  small  trout-rod  with  me,  and  trolled  a  salmon  tly  on 
the  chance.  -.There  were  no  salmon  there,  but  we  saw 
brown  trout  rising  ;  so  1  tried  the  universal  favorites — a 
March  brown  and  a  red  spinner — and  in  a  moment  had 
a  fish  that  bent  the  rod  double.  Another  followed,  aad 
another,  and  then  I  lost  a  large  one.     I  passed  the  rod  to 

X ,  in  whose  hands  it  did  better  service.     In  an  hour 

we  had  a  basket  of  trout  that  would  have  done  credit  to 
an  Englisli  chalk  stream.  The  largest  was  nearly  three 
pounds  weight,  admirably  grown,  and  pink  ;  fattened,  I 
suppose,  on  the  mussels  which  paved  the  bottom  of  the 
ra])ids.  We  were  off  immediately  after,  still  guided  to  a 
a  new  point  by  the  chart,  but  not  in  this  instance  by  the 
chart  only.     There  was  a  spot  which  had  been  discovered 

the  year  before  by  the  Duke  of ,  of  which  we  had 

a  vague  description.  We  had  a  log  on  board  which  iiad 
been  kept  by  the  duke's  mate,  in  which  he  had  recorded 
many  curious  experiences  ;  among  the  rest,  an  adventure 
at  a  certain  lake  not  very  far  from  where  wo  were.     Tho 


78  SKETCHES    FROM   J.   A.   FEOUDE. 

duke  had  been  successful  there,  and  liis  lady  had  been 
very  nearly  successful.  "We  had  grief  yesterday, "- 
the  mate  wrote,  "her  Grace  losing  a  twelve-pound 
salmon  which  she  had  caught  on  her  little  line,  and  just 
as  they  were  going  to  hook  it,  it  went  off,  and  we  were 
very  sorry."  The  grief  w^ent  deep,  it  seemed,  for  the 
next  day  the  crew  were  reported  as  only  "  being  as  well 
as  could  be  expected  after  so  melancholy  an  accident." 
We  determined  to  find  the  j)lace,  and,  if  possible,  avenge 
her  Grace.  We  crossed  the  Sogne  and  went  up  into  the 
Nord  Fjord — of  all  the  fjords  the  most  beautiful  ;  for  on 
either  side  there  are  low  terraces  of  land  left  by  glacier 
action,  and  more  signs  of  culture  and  human  habita- 
tions. After  running  for  fifty  miles,  we  turned  into  an 
inlet,  corresponding  tolerably  M'ith  the  duke's  directions, 
and  in  another  half  hour  w^e  were  again  in  a  mountain 
basin  like  that  which  we  had  left  in  the  morning.  The 
cataracts  were  in  their  glory,  the  day  having  been  warm 
for  a  wonder.  I  counted  seventeen  all  close  about  us 
when  we  anchored,  any  one  of  which  would  have  made 
the  fortune  of  a  Scotch  hotel,  and  would  have  been 
celebrated  by  Mr.  Murray  in  pages  of  passionate  elo- 
quence. But  Stromen  or  "the  Streams,"  as  the  place  # 
was  called,  was  less  solitary  than  Nord  Gulen.  There 
was  a  large  bonder's  farm  on  one  side  of  us.  There  was 
a  cluster  of  houses  at  the  mouth  of  a  river,  half  a  mile 
from  it.  Above  the  village  was  a  lake,  and  at  the  head 
of  the  lake  an  establishment  of  saw-mills.  A  gunshot 
from  where  we  lay,  on  a  rocky  knoll,  was  a  white  wooden 
church,  the  Sunday  meeting-place  of  the  neighborhood  ; 
boats  coming  to  it  from  twenty  miles  round  bringing 
families  in  their  bright  Sunday  attire.  Roads  there 
were  none.  To  have  made  a  league  of  road  among  such 
rocks  and  precipices  would  have  cost  the  state  a  year's 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS,  79 

revenue.  But  the  water  was  the  best  of  approaches, 
and  boats  the  cheapest  of  carriages.  We  called  on  the 
chief  bonder  to  ask  for  leave  to  fish  in  the  lake.  It  was 
granted  with  the  readiest  courtesy  ;  but  the  Norsemen 
are  proud  in  their  way,  and  do  not  like  the  English- 
man's habit  of  treating  all  the  world  as  if  it  belonged  to 
him.  The  low  meadows  round  his  house  were  bright 
with  flowers  :  two  kinds  of  wild  geranium,  an  exquisite 
vanety  of  harebell,  sea-pride,  pansies,  violets,  and  the 
great  pinguicola.  Among  the  rocks  were  foxgloves  in 
full  splendor,  and  wild  I'oses  just  coming  into  flower. 
The  roses  alone  of  the  Norway  flora  disappointed  me  ; 
the  leaves  are  large,  dark,  and  handsome  ;  the  flower  is 
insignificant,  and  falls  to  pieces  within  an  hour  of  its 
opening.  We  were  satisfied  that  we  were  on  the  right 
sp6t.  The  church  stood  on  a  peninsula,  the  neck  of 
which  immedi^ately  adjoined  our  anchorage.  Behind  it 
was  the  lake  which  had  been  the  scene  of  the  duchess's 
misfortune.  We  did  not  repeat  our  midnight  experi- 
ment. We  waited  for  a  leisurely  breakfast.  Five  of 
the  crew  then  canned  the  yacht's  cutter  through  fifty 
yards  of  buslies  ;  and  we  were  on  the  edge  of  the  lake 
itself,  which,  like  all  these  inland  waters,  was  glassy, 
still,  deep,  aiid  overhung  with  precipices.  The  bonder 
had  suggested  to  us  that  there  were  bears  among  them, 
which  we  nn'ght  kill  if  we  pleased,  as  they  had  just 
eaten  seven  of  his  sheep.  So  little  intention  had  we 
of  shooting  bears  that  we  had  not  brought  rifle  or  even 
gun  with  us.  Our  one  idea  was  to  catch  the  duchess's 
tu'clve-pound  salmon,  or,  if  not  that  one,  at  least  another 
of  his  kindred. 

In  a  strange  lake  it  is  well  always  to  try  first  with 
'^pinm'ng  tackle,  a  bait  trolled  with  a  long  line  from  the 
stern  of  a  boat  rowed  slowly.      It  will  tell   you    if   there 


80  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

are  fish  to  be  cauglit  ;  it  will  find  out  for  you  where  the 
fish  most  haunt,  if  there  are  any.  We  had  a  curious 
experience  of  the  value  of  this  method  on  a  later  occa- 
sion, and  on  one  of  our  failures.  We  had  found  a  lake 
joined  to  an  arm  of  a  fjord  by  a  hundred  yards  only  of 
clear  running  water.  We  felt  certain  of  finding  salmon 
there,  and  if  we  had  begun  with  flies  we  might  have 
fished  all  day  and  have  caught  nothing.  Instead  of  this 
we  began  to  spin.  In  five  minutes  we  had  a  run  ;  we 
watched  eagerly  to  see  what  we  had  got.  It  was  a 
whiting  pollock.  We  went  on.  We  hooked  a  heavy 
fish.  We  assured  ourselves  that  now  we  had  at  least  a 
trout.  It  turned  out  to  be  a  cod.  The  sea  fish,  we 
found,  ran  freely  into  the  fresh  water,  and  had  chased 
trout  and  salmon  completely  out.  At  Stromen  we  were 
in  better  luck.  We  started  with  phantom  minnows  on 
traces  of  strong  single  gut,  forty  yards  of  line,  and  forty 
more  in  reserve  on  the  reel.  Two  men  rowed  us  up  the 
shore  an  oar's  length  from  the  rocks.  Something  soon 
struck  me.  The  reel  flew  round,  the  line  spun  out.  In 
the  wake  of  the  boat  there  was  a  white  flash,  as  a  fish 
sprang  into  the  air.  Was  it  the  duchess's  salmon  ?  It 
was  very  like  it,  anyuay  ;  and  if  we  had  lost  him,  it 
would  have  been  entered  down  as  a  salmon.  It  proved, 
however,  to  be  no  salmon,  but  a  sea  trout,  and  such  a  sea 
trout  as  we  had  never  seen  ;  not  a  bull  trout,  not  a  peel, 
not  a  Welsh  sewin,  or  Irish  white  trout,  but  a  Nor- 
wegian, of  a  kind  of  its  own,  different  from  all  of 
them.  It  was  the  first  of  many  which  followed,  of  sizes 
varying  from  three  pounds  to  the  twelve  pounds  which 
the  mate  had  recorded  ;  fine,  bold,  fighting  fish,  good 
to  look  at,  good  to  catch,  and  as  good  to  eat  when  we 
tried  them.  Finally,  in  the  shallower  water,  at  the 
upper  end,  a  fish  took  me,  which  from  its  movements 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS.  81 

was  something  else,  and  proved  to  l)e  a  large  char,  like 
what  they  take  in  Derwent- water,  only  four  times  the 
weight.  Looking  carefully  at  the  water  we  saw  more 
char  swimming  leisurely  near  the  surface,  taking  flies. 
We  dropped  our  spinning  tackle,  and  took  our  fly  rods  ; 
and  presently  we  were  pulling  in  char,  the  blood  royal 
of  the  salmonidse,  the  elect  of  all  the  flnned  children  of 
the, fresh  water,  as  if  they  had  been  so  many  Thames 
chub. 

Wliat  need  to  talk  more  of  fish  ?  The  mate's  log  had 
guided  us  well.  We  caught  enough  and  to  spare,  and 
her  Grace's  wrongs  were  avenged  sufiiciently.  We 
landed  for  our  frugal  luncheon,  but  we  sate  in  a  bed  of 
whortleberries,  purple  with  ripe  fruit,  by  a  cascade 
which  ran  down  out  of  a  snow-field.  Horace  would 
have  invited  his  dearest  friend  to  share  in  such  a  ban- 
quet. -. 

The  next  day  was  Sunday.  The  sight  of  the  l)oats 
coming  from  all  quarters  to  church  was  very  pretty. 
Fifteen  hundred  people  at  least  must  have  collected.  I 
attended  the  service,  but  could  make  little  of  it.  I 
could  follow  the  hymns  with  a  book  ;  l)ut  copies  of  the 
Liturgy,  though  printed,  are  not  provided  for  general 
use,  and  are  reserved  to  the  clergy.  The  faces  of  the 
men  were  extremely  interesting.  There  Avas  nothing  in 
chem  to  suggest  the  old  freebooter.  Tlicy  were  mild 
and  gentle-looking,  with  fair  skins,  fair  hair,  and  liglit 
eyes,  gray  or  blue.  The  expression  was  sensible  and 
collected,  but  with  nothing  about  it  specially  adventurous 
or  daring.  The  women,  in  fact,  were  more  striking 
than  their  husbands.  There  was  a  steady  strength  in 
tlieir  features  wliicli  implied  humor  underneath.  Two 
girls,  I  suppose  sisters,  reminded  nie  of  ]\rrs.  Gaskell. 
With  the  Lutheran,  Sunday  afternoon  is  a  holiday.     A 


83  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

yacht  in  such  a  place  was  a  curiosity,  and  a  fleet  of  boats 
surrounded  us.  Such  as  hked  came  on  board  and  looked 
about  them.  They  were  well-bred,  and  showed  no 
foolish  surprise.  One  old  dame,  indeed,  being  taken 
down  into  the  ladies'  cabin,  did  find  it  too  much  for 
her.  She  dropped  down  and  kissed  the  carpet.  One 
of  our  party  wondered  afterward  whether  there  was  any 
chance  of  the  Norwegians  attaining  a  higher  civilization. 
I  asked  her  to  define  civilization.  Did  industry,  skill, 
energy,  sufficient  food  and  raiment,  sound  practical 
education,  and  piety  which  believes  without  asking  ques- 
tions, constitute  civilization  ;  and  would  luxury,  news- 
papers, and  mechanics'  institutes  mean  a  higher  civiliza- 
tion ?  The  old  question  must  first  be  answered.  What 
is  the  real  purpose  of  human  life  ? 

At  Stromen,  too,  we  could  not  linger  ;  we  stopped  a 
few  hours  at  Daviken  on  our  way  north,  a  considerable 
place  for  Norway,  on  the  Nord  Fjord.  There  is  a 
bishop,  I  believe,  belonging  to  it,  but  him  we  did  not 
see.  We  called  at  the  parsonage  and  found  the  pastor's 
wife  and  children.  The  pastor  himself  came  on  board 
afterward — a  handsome  man  of  sixty-seven,  with  a 
broad,  full  forehead,  large  nose,  and  straight,  grizzled 
hair.  He  spoke  English,  and  Vvould  have  spoken  Latin 
if  we  had  ourselves  been  equal  to  it.  He  had  read 
much  English  literature,  and  was  cultivated  above  the 
level  of  our  own  average  country  clergy.  His  parish  was 
thirty  miles  long  on  both  sides  of  the  fjord.  He  had 
several  churches,  to  all  of  which  he  attended  in  turn, 
with  boats  in  summer,  and  I  suppose  the  ice  in  winter 
We  did  not  ask  his  salary  ;  it  was  doubtless  small,  but 
sufficient.  He  had  a  school  under  him,  which  he  said 
was  well  attended.  The  master,  who  had  a  state  cer- 
tificate, was  allowed  £25  a  vear,  on  which  he  was  able 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS.  83 

to  maintain  himself.  We  could  not  afford  time  to  see 
more  of  this  gentleman,  however.  "We  were  impatient 
for  Trondhjem  ;  the  engineer  wanted  coals  ;  we  wanted 
our  letters  and  newspapers  ;  and  the  steward  wanted  a 
washerwoman.  On  our  way  up,  too,  we  had  arranged 
to  giv'e  a  day  or  two  to  Romsdal,  Rolf  the  Ganger's 
country — on  an  island  in  Romsdal  Fjord  the  ruins  can 
still  be  seen  of  Rolf's  castle.  It  was  there  that  Rolf,  or 
Rollo  as  we  call  him,  set  out  with  his  comrades  to  con- 
quer .Normandy,  and  produce  the  chivalry  who  fought 
at  fiastings  and  organized  feudal  England.  This  was 
not  to  be  missed  ;  and  as  little,  a  visit  which  we  had 
pron)ised  to  a  descendant  of  one  of  those  Normans,  a 
distinguished  Tory  member  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
and  lord  of  half  an  English  county.  He  had  bought  an 
estaie  in  these  parts,  with  a  salmon  river,  and  had  built 
himself  a  house  there. 

Romsdal,  independent  of  its  antiquarian  interest,  is 
geologically  the  most  remarkable  place  which  we  saw  in 
Norway.  The  fjord  expands  into  a  wide  estuary  or 
large  inland  lake,  into  which  many  valleys  open  and 
several  large  streams  discharge  themselves.  Romsdal 
proper  was  once  evidently  itself  a  continuation  of  the 
Great  Fjord.  The  mountains  on  each  side  of  it  are 
peculiarly  magnificent.  On  the  left  RomsdaPs  Horn 
shoots  u])  into  the  sky,  a  huge  peak  which  no  one  has 
ever  climbed,  and  will  try  the  mettle  of  the  Alpine  Ohib 
when  they  have  conquered  Switzerland.  On  the  right 
is  a  precipitous  wall  of  cliffs  and  crags  as  high  and  Ixild 
as  the  Horn  itself.  The  upper  end  of  the  valley  which 
divides  them  terminates  in  a  narrow  fissure,  through 
which  a  river  thunders  down  that  carries  the  water  of 
the  great  central  ice-field  into  the  valley.  From  thence 
it  finds  its  w;iy  into  the  fjord,  i-iinning  through  the  glen 


84  SKETCHES   FROM    J.  A.   FROUDE. 

itself,  wliicli  is  seven  or  eiglit  miles  long,  two  miles  wide, 
and  richly  cultivated  and  wooded.  From  the  sea  the 
appearance  of  the  shore  is  most  singular.  It  is  laid  out 
in  level,  grassy  terraces,  stretching  all  round  the  bay, 
rising  in  tiers  one  above  the  other,  so  smooth,  so  even, 
so  nicely  scarfed,  that  the  imagination  can  hardly  be 
persuaded  that  they  are  not  the  work  of  human  en- 
gineers. But  under  water  the  formation  is  the  same. 
At  one  moment  you  are  in  twenty  fathoms,  the  next  in 
forty,  the  next  your  cable  will  find  no  bottom  ;  and  it 
is  as  certain  as  any  conclusion  on  such  subjects  can  be, 
that  long  ago,  long  ages  before  Rolf,  and  Knut,  and  the 
vikings,  the  main  fjord  was  blocked  with  ice  ;  that  while 
the  ice  barrier  was  still  standing,  and  the  valleys  behind 
it  were  fresh-water  lakes,  the  rivers  gradually  filled  them 
with  a  dehris  of  stone  and  soil.  Each  level  terrace  was 
once  a  lake  bottom.  The  ice  broke  or  melted  away  at 
intervals.  The  water  was  lowered  suddenly  forty  or  fifty 
feet,  and  the  ground  lately  covered  was  left  bare  as  the 
ice  receded.  We  found  our  Englishman.  His  house  is 
under  the  Horn  at  the  bend  of  the  valley,  where  the 
ancient  fjord  must  have  ended.  It  stands  in  a  green, 
open  meadow,  approached  through  alder  and  birch 
woods,  the  first  cataract  where  the  snow-water  plunges 
through  the  great  chasm  being  in  sight  of  the  windows, 
and  half  a  dozen  inimitable  salmon  pools  within  a  few 
minutes'  walk.  The  house  itself  was  simple  enough, 
made  of  pine  wood  entirely,  as  the  Norway  houses 
always  are,  and  painted  white.  It  contained  some  half 
dozen  rooms,  furnished  in  the  j^lainest  English  style,  the 
summer  house  of  a  sportsman  who  is  tired  of  luxury, 
and  finds  the  absence  of  it  an  agreeable  exchange.  A 
man  cannot  be  always  catching  salmon,  even  in  Norway, 
and  a  smattering  of  science  and  natural  history  would 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS.  85 

be  a  serviceable  equi]")meut  in  a  scene  where  there  are  so 
many  curious  objects  worth  attending  to.  Our  friend's 
tastes,  however,  did  not  lie  in  that  direction.  His 
shelves  were  full  of  jellow-backed  novels — French, 
En2:]ish,  and  German.  His  table  was  covered  with  tlie 
everlasting  Saturday  Revieic,  Pall  Mall  Gazette, 
Times,  and  Standard.  I  think  he  suspected  science 
as^^art  of  modern  Liberalism  ;  for  he  was  a  Tory  of  the 
Tories,  a  man  with  w^hom  the  destinies  had  dealt  kindly, 
in  whose  eyes  therefore  all  existing  arrangements  were 
as  they  should  be,  and  those  who  wished  to  meddle  with 
them  were  enemies  of  the  human  race.  He  was  sad  and 
sorrowful.  The  world  was  not  moving  to  his  mind,  and 
he  spoke  as  if  he  was  ultimus  Bomanorum.  But  if  an 
aristocrat,  he  was  an  aristocrat  of  the  best  type — princely 
in  his  thought,  princely  in  his  habits,  princely  even  in 
his  salmon  fislrfng.  The  pools  in  the  river  being  divided 
by  difficult  rapids,  he  had  a  boat  and  a  boatman  for  each. 
The  sport  was  ample  but  uniform.  There  was  an  ice 
cellar  under  the  house,  where  we  saw  half  a  dozen  great 
salmon  lying  which  had  been  caught  in  the  morning. 
One  salmon  behaves  much  like  another  ;  and  after  one 
has  caught  four  or  five,  and  when  one  knows  that  one 
can  catch  as  many  more  as  one  wishes,  impatient  people 
might  find  the  occupation  monotonous.  Happily  there 
was  a  faint  element  of  uncertainty  still  left.  It  was 
possible  to  fail  even  in  the  Romsdal.  We  were  our- 
selves launched  in  boats  in  diiferent  pools  at  the  risk  of 
our  lives  to  try  our  hands  ;  wc  Avorked  diligently  for  a 
couple  of  hours,  and  I  at  least  moved  not  so  much  as  a 
fin.  It  was  more  entertaining  a  great  deal  to  listen  to 
our  host  as  he  declaimed  upon  the  iniciuities  of  (nn* 
present  Radical  chief.  J^olitics,  like  religi(jn,  are  mat- 
ters of  faith  on  which  reason  says  as  little  as  possible. 


86  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FKOUDE. 

One  passionate  belief  is  an  antidote  to  another.  It  is 
impossible  to  continue  to  believe  enthusiastically  in  a 
creed  which  a  fellow- mortal  with  as  much  sense  as  one- 
self denies  and  execrates,  and  the  collision  of  opinion 
produces  the  prudent  scepticism  which  in  most  matters 
is  the  least  mischievous  frame  of  mind. 

Here,  too,  in  these  pleasant  surroundings  we  would 
gladly  have  loitered  for  a  day  or  two  ;  but  the  steward 
was  clamorous  over  his  dirty  linen,  and  it  was  not  to 
be.  Trondhjem,  on  which  our  intentions  had  been  so 
long  fixed,  was  reached  at  last.  The  weather  had  grown 
cold  again,  cold  with  cataracts  of  rain.  Let  no  one  go 
to  Norway  even  in  the  dog-days  without  a  winter  ward- 
robe. The  sea- water  in  our  baths  was  at  47"  ;  we  had 
fires  in  the  cabin  stove,  and  could  not  warm  ourselves  ;  we 
shivered  under  four  blankets  in  our  berths.  The  moun- 
tains were  buried  in  clouds,  and  the  landscape  was 
reduced  to  dull  gray  mist ;  but  the  worst  of  weathers 
will  serve  for  reading  letters,  laying  in  coal,  and  wander- 
ing about  a  town. 

Trondhjem  ought  to  have  been  interesting.  It  was 
the  capital  of  the  old  Norse  kings.  There  reigned  the 
Olafs.  It  lies  half  way  up  the  Norway  coast  in  the  very 
centre  of  the  kingdom,  on  a  broad,  land-locked  bay. 
The  situation  was  chosen  for  its  strength  ;  for  a  deep 
river  all  but  surrounds  the  peninsula  on  which  the  town 
is  built,  and  on  the  land  side  it  must  have  been  im- 
pregnable. The  country  behind  it  is  exceptionally  fer- 
tile, and  is  covered  over  with  thriving  farms  ;  but  streets 
and  shops  are  wearisome,  and  even  the  cathedral  did  not 
tempt  us  to  pay  it  more  than  a  second  visit.  It  is  a 
stern,  solid  piece  of  building  ;  early  Norman  in  type, 
with  doors,  \\nndows,  and  arches  of  zigzag  pattern.  It 
had  fallen  out  of  repair,  and  is  now  being  restored  by  the 


THE    NORWAY    FJORDS.  87 

state  ;  hundreds  of  workmen  are  busy  chi'iDping  and 
hammering,  and  are  doing  their  business  so  well  that  the 
new  work  can  hardly  be  distinguished  from  the  old. 
But  Catholic  Christianity  never  seems  to  have  got  any 
hearty  hold  on  Norway.  St.  Olaf  thrust  it  upon  the 
people  at  the  sword's  point,  but  their  imaginations  re- 
mained heathen  till  the  Reformation  gave  them  a  creed 
•sdiich  they  could  believe.  I  could  not  find  a  single 
tolnb  in  the  cathedral.  1  inquired  where  the  old  kings 
and  chiefs  were  buried,  and  no  one  could  tell  me.  I 
found,  in  fact,  that  they  had  usually  come  to  an  end  in 
some  sea  battle,  and  had  found  their  graves  in  their  own 
element.  Olaf  Tryggveson  went  down,  the  last  survivor 
in  the  last  ship  of  his  fleet,  the  rays  of  the  sunset  flash- 
ino^  on  his  armor  as  the  waves  closed  over  him.  St. 
CTlaf  died  in  the  same  way.  The  entire  absence  of 
monumental,£tones  or  figures  in  the  great  metropolitan 
church  of  Norway  is  strange,  sad,  and  impressive. 

The  town  being  exhausted,  we  drove  a  few  miles  out 
of  it  to  see  a  foss,  one  of  the  grandest  in  the  country. 
We  said  "  Oh  !"'  to  it,  as  Wolfe  Tone  did  to  G rattan. 
But  waterfalls  had  become  too  common  with  us,  and,  in 
fact,  the  excitement  about  them  has  always  seemed  exag- 
gerated to  me.  I  was  staying  once  in  a  house  in  the 
north  of  New  York  State  when  a  gentleman  came  in 
fresh  from  Niagara,  and  poured  out  his  astonishment 
over  the  enormous  mass  of  water  falling  into  the 
cauldron  below.  "Why  is  it  astonishing  f '  asked  a 
Yankee  who  was  present.  "  Why  shouldn't  the  water 
fall  ?     The  astonishing  thing  would  be  if  it  didn't  fall." 

In  short,  we  left  the  washerwoman  in  possession  of 
the  linen,  which  we  could  return  and  pick  up  wlicn  it 
was  done,  and  we  steamed  away  to  examine  tlie  great 
Trondhjem  Fjord  ;  fishing  and  making  bad  sketches  as 


88  SKETCHES  FROM  J.  A.  FROUDE. 

tlie  weather  would  allow.  Tl>e  weather  generally  al- 
lowed us  to  do  very  little,  and  drove  us  upon  our 
books,  which  we  could  have  read  as  well  in  our  rooms  at 
home.  I  had  brought  the  "  Elective  Affinities"  with 
me.  I  had  not  read  it  for  thirty  years.  Then  it  had 
seemed  to  me  the  wisest  of  all  didactic  works.  "  Un- 
conscious cerebration,"  as  Dr.  Carpenter  calls  it,  when 
I  read  it  again,  had  revolutionized  my  principles  of 
judgment.  1  could  still  recognize  the  moral  purpose. 
There  are  tendencies  in  human  nature,  hke  the  chemical 
properties  of  material  substances,  which  will  claim  pos- 
session of  you,  and  even  appear  to  have  a  moral  right 
over  you.  But  if  yon  yield  you  will  be  destroyed. 
You  can  command  yourself,  and  you  must.  Yery  true, 
very  excellent  ;  and  set  forth  with  Goethe's  greatest 
power  of  fascination  ;  but  I  found  myself  agreeing  with 
the  rest  of  the  world,  that  it  was  a  monstrous  book  after 
all.  To  put  the  taste  out  I  tried  Seneca,  but  I  scarcely 
improved  matters.  Seneca's  fame  as  a  moralist  and 
philosojiher  was  due,  perhaps,  in  the  first  instance,  to 
his  position  about  the  court  and  to  his  enormous  wealth. 
A  little  merit  passes  for  a  great  deal  when  it  is  framed 
in  gold — once  established  it  would  remain,  from  the 
natural  liking  of  men  for  virtuous  cant.  Those  lectures 
to  Lucilius  on  the  beauty  of  poverty  from  the  greatest 
money-lender  and  usurer  in  the  empire  !  Lucilius  is  to 
practise  voluntary  hardships,  is  to  live  at  intervals  on 
beggars'  fare,  and  sleep  on  beggars'  pallets,  that  he  may- 
sympathize  in  the  sufferings  of  mortality  and  be  inde- 
pendent of  outward  things.  If  Seneca  meant  it,  why 
did  he  squeeze  five  millions  of  our  money  out  of  the 
provinces  with  loans  and  contracts  ?  He  was  barren  as 
the  Sahara  to  me.  Not  a  green  sj-tot  could  I  find,  not  a 
single  genial  honest  thought,  in  all  the  four  volumes 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS.  89 

with  wliicli  I  liad  encumbered  myself.  His  finest 
periods  rang  hollow  like  brass  sovereigns. 

The  rain  would  not  stop,  so  we  agreed  to  defy  the  rain 
and  to  fish  in  spite  of  it.  We  had  the  fjord  before  us 
for  a  week,  and  we  landed  wherever  we  could  hear  of 
lake  or  river.  For  twelve  hours  together  the  waterspout 
would  come  down  upon  us ;  we  staggered  about  in 
thickest  woollen,  with  macintoshes,  and  india-rubber 
bot)ts.  With  flapped  oilskin  hats  we  should  have  been 
weather-proof,  but  with  one  of  these  I  was  unprovided  ; 
and,  in  spite  of  collars  and  woollen  wrappers,  the  water 
would  find  its  way  down  our  necks  till  there  was  nothing 
dry  left  about  us  but  the  feet.  Clothes  grow  heavy 
under  such  conditions  ;  we  had  to  take  our  lightest 
rods  with  us,  and  now  and  then  came  to  grief.  I  was 
fisliing  alone  one  day  in  a  broad,  rocky  stream  fringed 
with  alder  bushes,  dragging  my  landing-net  along  with 
me.  At  an  open  spot  where  there  was  a  likely  run 
within  reach  I  had  caught  a  four-pound  sea  trout.  I 
threw  again  ;  a  larger  fish  rose  and  carried  off  my  fly. 
I  mounted  a  "  doctor,"  blue  and  silver,  on  the  strongest 
casting-line  in  my  book,  and  on  the  second  cast  a  salmon 
came.  The  river  in  the  middle  was  running  like  a  mill- 
sluice.  1  could  not  follow  along  the  bank  for  the  trees  ; 
my  only  hope  was  to  hold  on  and  drag  the  monster  into 
the  slack  water  under  the  shore.  My  poor  little  rod  did 
its  best,  but  its  best  was  not  enough  ;  the  salmon  found 
his  way  into  the  waves,  round  went  tlie  reel,  off  flew  the 
hue  to  the  last  inch,  and  then  came  the  inevitable 
catastrophe.  The  fish  sprang  wildly  into  the  aif,  tlie 
rod  straightened  out,  the  line  came  home,  and  my 
salmon  and  niy  briglit  doctor  sped  away  together  to  the, 
sea. 

We  were    none  the  worse  for    our   wettings,      l-ladi 


Ou'  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDK. 

evening  we  came  home  dripping  and  draggled.  A  degree 
or  two  more  of  cold  would  have  turned  the  rain  into 
snow.  Yet  it  signified  nothing.  We  brought  back  our 
basketfuls  of  trout,  and  the  Norwegian  trout  are  the 
best  in  the  world.  We  anchored  one  evening  in  a  chasm 
with  the  mountain  walls  rising  in  precipices  on  both 
sides.  The  next  morning  as  I  was  lying  in  my  berth 
I  heard  a  conversation  between  the  steward  and  the 
captain.  The  captain  asked  the  orders  for  the  day  ;  the 
steward  answered  (he  was  the  wit  of  the  ship),  "  Orders 
are  to  stretch  an  awning  over  the  fjord  that  his  lordship 
may  fish." 

But  the  weather  so  far  beat  us  that  w^e  were  obliged  to 
abandon  Lofoden.  We  were  now  at  the  end  of  July, 
and  it  was  not  likely  to  mend,  so  we  determined  to  turn 
about  and  spend  the  rest  of  our  time  in  the  large  fjords 
of  south  Norway.  Trondhjem  had  been  our  furthest 
point  ;  we  could  not  coal  there  after  all,  so  we  had  to 
make  for  Christiansund  on  the  way.  I  was  not  sorry  for 
it,  for  Christiansund  is  a  curious  little  bustling  place, 
and  worth  seeing.  It  is  the  headquarters  of  the  North 
Sea  fishing  trade  near  the  open  ocean,  and  the  harbor  is 
formed  by  three  or  four  islands  divided  by  extremely 
narrow^  channels,  with  a  deep,  roomy  basin  in  the  middle 
of  them.  One  of  our  crew  was  ill  and  had  to  be  taken 
for  two  or  three  days  to  the  hospital.  The  arrange- 
ments seemed  excellent,  as  every  public  department  is 
in  Norway.  The  town  was  pretty.  The  Norwegians 
dress  plainly  ;  but  they  like  bright  colors  for  their 
houses,  and  the  red-tiled  roofs  and  blue  and  yellow 
painted  fronts  looked  pleasant  after  our  clouds  of  mist. 
The  climate  from  the  proximity  of  the  ocean  is  said  to 
be  mild  for  its  latitude.  The  snow  lies  up  to  the  lower 
windows  through  tlie  winter,  but  that  went  for  nothing. 


THE    NORWAY    F.TORT)S.  91 

There  were  stocks  and  coluiubines  in  the  gardens  ; 
there  were  ripe  gooseberries  and  red  currants  and  pink 
thorn  and  laburnum  in  flower.  The  ]iarbor  was  full  of 
fishing-smacks,  like  Brixhani  trawlers,  only  rather  more 
old-fashioned.  Gay  steam  ferry-boats  rushed  about 
from  island  to  island  ;  large  ships  were  loading  ;  well- 
dressed  strangers  were  in  the  streets  and  shops  ;  an 
English  yacht  had  come  like  ourselves  to  take  in  coal, 
atfd  was  moored  side  by  side  with  us.  There  are  fewer 
people  in  the  world  than  we  imagine,  and  we  fall  on  old 
acquaintances  when  we  least  expect  them.     The  once 

t)eautiful was  on  board  whom  I  had  known  forty - 

five  years  ago.  She  had  married  a  distinguished  en- 
gineer, who  was  out  for  his  holiday. 

We  stayed  at  Christiansund  or  in  the  neighborhood 
till  our  sick  man  was  recovered,  and  then  followed 
(under  bettor  auspices  as  regarded  weather)  ten  days  of 
scenery  hunting  which  need  not  be  described.  We 
went  to  Sondal,  Lserdal,  IS'ordal,  and  I  don't  know^  how 
many  "  dais,"  all  famous  places  in  their  way,  but  with 
a  uniformity  of  variety  w'hich  becomes  tedious  in  a  story. 
One  only  noticeable  feature  I  observed  about  the  sheds 
and  poorer  houses  in  these  out-of-the-way  districts. 
They  lay  turf  sods  over  the  roofs,  which  become  thick 
masses  of  vegetation  ;  and  on  a  single  cottage  roof  you 
may  see  half  a  dozen  trees  growing  ten  or  fifteen  feet 
high.  For  lakes  and  mountains,  however  beautiful,  the 
appetite  soon  becomes  satiated.  They  please,  but  they 
cease  to  excite  ;  and  there  is  something  artificial  in  the 
modern  enthusiasm  for  landscapes.  Velasquez  or  Kubens 
could  appreciate  a  fine  effect  of  scenery  as  well  as  Turner 
or  Stansfield  ;  but  with  them  it  w^as  a  framework,  sub- 
ordinate to  some  human  interest  in  the  centre  of  the 
picture.      I  suppose  it  is  I)ecausc  man  in  these  democratic 


92  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FJIOUDE. 

days  lias  for  a  time  ceased  to  touch  tlie  imagination  that 
our  poets  and  artists  are  driven  back  upon  rocks  and 
rivers  and  trees  and  skies  ;  but  the  eclipse  can  only  be 
temporary,  and  I  confess,  for  myself,  that,  sublime  as 
the  fjords  were,  the  saw-mills  and  farmhouses  and  iish- 
ing-boats,  and  the  patient,  industrious  people  wresting 
a  wholesome  living  out  of  that  stern  environment,  affected 
me  very  much  more  nearly.  I  cannot  except  even  the 
Geiranger,  as  tremendous  a  piece  of  natural  architecture 
as  exists  in  the  globe.  Tlie  fjord  in  the  Geiranger  is  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  wide  and  six  hundred  fathoms  deep. 
The  walls  of  it  are  in  most  places  not  figuratively,  but 
literally,  precipices,  and  the  patch  of  sky  above  your 
head  seems  to  narrow  as  you  look  up.  I  hope  I  was 
duly  impressed  with  the  wonder  of  this  ;  but  even  here 
there  was  something  which  impressed  me  more,  and  that 
was  the  singular  haymaking  which  was  going  on.  The 
Norwegians  depend  for  their  existence  on  their  sheep 
and  cattle.  Every  particle  of  grass  available  for  hay  is 
secured  ;  and  grass,  peculiarly  nutritious,  often  grows 
on  the  high  ridges  two  thousand  feet  up.  This  they 
save  as  they  can,  and  they  have  original  ways  of  doing 
it.  In  the  Geiranger  it  is  tied  tightly  in  bundles  and 
flung  over  the  cliffs  to  be  gathered  up  in  boats  below. 
But  science,  too,  is  making  its  way  in  this  nortiiern 
wilderness.  The  farmhouses,  for  shelter's  sake,  are 
always  at  the  bottom  of  valleys,  and  are  generally  near 
the  sea.  At  one  of  our  anchorages,  shut  in  as  usual 
among  the  mountains,  we  observed  one  evening  from 
the  deck  what  looked  like  a  troop  of  green  goats  skip- 
ping and  bounding  down  the  cliffs.  We  discovered 
through  a  binocular  that  they  were  bundles  of  hay. 
The  clever  bonder  had  carried  up  a  wire,  like  a  tele- 
graph wire,  from  his  coui'tyard  to  a  projecting  point  of 


THE    XORWAT    FJORDS.  93 

mountain  ;  on  tins  ran  iron  rings    as  travellers  wliich 
brought  the  grass  directly  to  his  door. 

Twice  only  in  our  wanderings  we  had  fallen  in  with 
our  tourist  countrymen  :  once  at  Lferdal,  where  a  high- 
road comes  down  to  a  pier,  and  is  met  there  by  a  corre- 
sponding steamer  ;  the  second  time  coming  down  from 
the  Geiranger,  when  we  passed  a  boat  with  two  ladies 
and  a  gentleman,  English  evidently,  the  gentleman 
toucliing  liis  hat  to  the  Yacht  Club  flag  as  we  went  by. 
Strange  and  pleasant  the  short  glimpse  of  English  faces 
in  that  wild  chasm  !  But  we  were  plunged  into  the 
very  middle  of  our  countrymen  at  the  last  spot  to  which 
we  went  in  search  of  the  picturesque — a  spot  worth  a 
few  words  as  by  far  the  most  reguhirly  beautiful  of  all 
the  places  which  we  visited.  At  the  head  of  one  of  the 
long  inlets  which  runs  south,  I  think,  out  of  the 
Hardanger  Fjord  (but  our  rapid  movements  were  con- 
fusing) stands  Odde,  once  a  holy  place  in  Scandinavian 
mvtholoffical  history.  There  is  another  Odde  in  Ice- 
land,  also  sacred— I  suppose  Odin  had  something  to  do 
with  it.  The  Odde  Fjord  is  itself  twenty  miles  long, 
and  combines  the  softest  and  grandest  aspects  of  Nor- 
wegian scenery.  The  shores  are  exceptionally  well 
cultivated,  richer  than  any  which  we  had  seen.  Every 
half  mile  sonu3  pretty  farmhouse  was  shining  red  through 
clumps  of  trees,  the  nuniy  cattle-sheds  speaking  for  the 
wealth  of  the  owner.  Above,  through  the  rifts  of  higher 
ranges,  you  catch  a  sight  of  the  central  ice-field  glacier 
streaming  over  among  the  broken  chasms  and  melting 
i  to  waterfalls.  At  Odde  itself  there  is  an  extensive 
tract  of  fertile  soil  on  the  slope  of  a  vast  moraine,  which 
stretches  completely  across  the  bn.ad  valley.  On  the 
sea  at  the  landing-place  is  a  large  churdi  ;nid  two  <m.ii- 
biderable  hotels,  which  were  thronged  with  visitors.      A 


94  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FROUDE. 

bi'oad  road  excellently  engineered  leads  down  to  it,  and 
we  found  a  staff  of  English-speaking  guides  whose 
services  we  did  not  require.  We  had  seen  much  of 
the  ice  action  elsewhere,  but  the  performances  of  it  at 
Odde  were  more  wonderful  even  than  at  Romsdal.  The 
moraine  is  perhaps  four  hundred  and  fifty  feet  high  ; 
the  road  winds  up  the  side  of  it  among  enormous  granite 
boulders,  many  of  them  weighing  thousands  of  tons, 
which  the  ice  has  tossed  about  like  pebble  stones.  On 
reaching  the  crest  you  see  a  lake  a  quarter  of  a  mile  off  ; 
but  before  you  come  to  it  you  cross  some  level  fields, 
very  rich  to  look  at,  and  witli  patches  of  white-heart 
cherry-trees  scattered  about,  the  fruit,  when  we  came 
there  at  the  end  of  August,  being  actually  ripe  and 
extremely  good.  These  fields  were  the  old  lake  bottom  ; 
but  the  river  has  cut  a  dike  for  itself  through  the  top 
of  the  moraine,  and  the  lake  has  gone  down  some  twenty 
feet,  leaving  them  dry. 

The  weather  (penitent,  perhaps,  -^'or  having  so  long 
persecuted'  us)  was  in  a  better  humor.  Our  days  at 
Odde  were  warm  and  without  a  cloud,  and  we  spent 
them  chiefly  by  the  lake,  which  was  soft  as  Windermere. 
We  had  come  into  a  land  of  fruit  ;  not  cherries  only, 
but  wild  raspberries  and  strawberries  were  offered  us  in 
leaves  by  the  girls  on  the  road.  The  road  itself  followed 
the  lake  margin,  among  softly  rounded  and  wooded 
hills,  the  great  mountains  out  of  sight  behind  them, 
save  only  in  one  spot  where,  through  a  gorge,  you 
looked  straight  up  to  the  eternal  snow-field,  from  which 
a  vast  glacier  descended  almost  into  the  lake  itself,  the 
ice  imitating  precisely  the  form  of  falling  water,  crush- 
ing its  way  among  the  rocks,  parting  in  two  where  it 
met  a  projecting  crag,  and  uniting  again  behind  it, 
seemino;  even  to  heave  and  toss  in  ane-rv  waves  of  foam. 

O  0         4/ 


THE    XORWAY    F.TOUDS.  05 

From  this  glacier  the  lake  was  chiefly  fed,  and  was 
blue,  like  skimmed  milk,  in  consequence.  "We  walked 
along  it  for  several  miles.  Fishing  seemed  hopeless  in 
water  of  such  a  texture.  As  we  turned  a  corner  two 
carriages  dashed  by  us  with  some  young  men  and  dogs 
and  guns  —  cockneys  out  for  their  holiday.  ''  Any 
sport,  sir  V '  one  of  them  shouted  to  me,  seeing  a  I'od 
in,  my  hand,  in  the  cheerful,  familiar  tone  which 
assumed  that  sport  must  be  the  first  and  only  object 
which  one  could  have  in  such  a  place.  They  p.-issed  on 
tojihe  hotel,  and  the  presence  of  so  many  of  our  conntry- 
fiien  was  inclining  us  to  cut  short  our  own  stay.  Some 
of  the  party,  however,  wished  to  inspect  the  glacier. 
We  were  ourselv^es  assured  that  there  were  salmon  in 
the  lake,  which,  in  spite  of  the  color,  could  be  caught 
th'ere.  It  was  the  last  op]-)ortunity  which  we  should 
have,  as  after  Odde  our  next  move  was  to  be  Chris- 
tiania.  So  we  agreed  to  take  one  more  day  there  and 
make  the  most  of  it.  We  got  two  native  boats,  and 
started  to  seek  adventures.  Alas  !  we  had  the  loveliest 
views  ;  but  the  blue  waters  of  Odde,  however  fair  to 
look  upon,  proved  as  ill  to  fish  in  as  at  the  first  sight  of 
them  we  were  assured  they  must  be.  Our  phantoms 
could  not  be  seen  three  inches  off,  and  tlie  stories  told 
us  we  concluded  to  be  fables  invented  for  the  tourists. 
I,  for  my  own  part,  had  gone  to  the  furthest  cxtrcnn'ty 
Df  the  lake,  where  it  ended  in  a  valley  like  Borrodale. 
I  was  being  rowed  listlessly  back,  having  laid  aside  my 
tackle,  and  wishing  that  1  could  talk  to  my  old  boatman, 
who  looked  as  if  all  the  stories  of  the  Edda  were  inside 
him,  when  my  eye  was  siiddently  caught  by  a  cascade 
('i)mine  down  out  of  a  ravine  into  the  lake  which  had  not 
been  bred  in  the  glaciers,  and  was  limpid  as  the  Ttchen 
itself.     At  the  month  of  this  it   was  just   possible   that 


96  SKETCHES    FROM    .).   A.    FROUDE. 

there  might  be  a  char  or  something  witii  fins  that  couid 
see  to  rise.  It  was  my  duty  to  do  what  1  could  for  the 
yacht's  cuisine.  I  put  together  my  little  trout-rod  for 
a  last  attempt,  and  made  my  boatman  row  me  over  to 
it.  The  clear  water  was  not  mixing  with  the  blue,  but 
pushing  its  way  through  the  milky  masses,  which  were 
eddying  and  rolling  as  if  they  were  oil.  In  a  moment  1 
had  caught  a  sea  trout.  Immediately  after  I  caught  a 
second,  and  soon  a  basketful.  They  had  been  attracted 
by  the  purer  liquid,  and  were  gathered  there  in  a  shoal. 
They  were  lying  with  their  noses  up  the  stream  at  the 
furthest  point  to  which  they  could  go.  I  got  two  or 
three,  and  those  the  largest,  by  throwing  my  fly  against 

the  rocks   exactly  at  the  fall.     X came  afterward 

and  caught  more  and  bigger  iish  than  I  did  ;  and  our 
sport,  which  indeed  we  had  taken  as  it  came  without 
specially  seeking  for  it,  was  brought  to  a  good  end. 
The  end  of  August  was  come,  and  with  it  the  period  of 
our  stay  in  the  fjords.  We  had  still  to  see  Christiania, 
and  had  no  time  to  lose.  But  of  all  the  bits  of  pure 
natural  loveliness  wdiich  we  had  fallen  in  with,  Odde 
and  its  blue  lake,  and  glacier,  and  cherry  orchards,  and 
Maid  strawberries  has  left  the  fairest  impression  ;  per- 
haps, however,  only  because  it  was  the  last,  for  we  were 
going  home  ;  and  they  say  that  when  a  man  dies,  the 
last  image  which  he  has  seen  is  photographed  on  his 
retina. 

But  now  away.  The  smoke  pours  through  the  fun- 
nel. The  steam  is  snorting  like  an  impatient  horse. 
The  quick  rattle  of  the  cable  says  that  the  anchor  is  olf 
the  ground.  We  were  off,  and  had  done  with  fjords. 
The  inner  passages  would  serve  no  longer  ;  we  had 
to  make  for  open  sea  once  more  to  round  the  foot  of  the 
peninsula.     It  is  at  no  time  the  softest  of  voyages.     The 


THE   NORWAY    FJORDS.  97 

North  Sea  is  not  the  home  of  cahii  sunsets  and  light- 
breathing  zepliyrs,  and  it  gave  lis  a  taste  of  its  quality, 
which,   after   our   long   sojourn   in   smooth   water,  was 
rather  startling.     If  the  wind  and  sea  are  ever  wildet 
than  we  found  them  in  those  latitudes,  I  have  no  desire 
to  be  present  at  the  exhibition.     We  fought  the  storm  for 
twenty-four  hours,  and  were  then  driven  for  refuge  into 
a  roadstead  at  the  southern  extremity  of  Norway  near 
Mandal.     Tlie  neighborhood  was  interesting,  if  we  had 
known  it,  for  at  Mandal  Mary  Stuart's  Earl  of  Bothwell 
was  imprisoned  when  he  escaped  from  the  Orkneys  to 
Denmark.     The  dungeon  wliere  he  was  confined  is  still 
to  be  seen,  and  as  the  earl  was  an  exceptional  villain, 
the  Piithentic  evidence  of  eyesight  that  he  had  spent  an 
uncomfortable  time  in  his  exile  would  not  have  been 
unwelcome.     But  we  discovered  what  we  had  lost  when 
it  was  too  late- to  profit  by  our  infonnation.     We  amused 
ourselves   by   wandering   on   shore   and   observing   the 
effect   of   the   change   of   latitude   on  vegetation.     We 
found  the  holly  thriving,  of  which  in  the  north  we  had 
not  seen  a  trace,  and  the  hazel  bushes  had  ripe  nuts  on 
them.     There  was  still  a  high  sea  the  next  day  ;  but  we 
made  thirty  miles  along  the  coast  to  Arendal,  an  ad- 
vanced,   thriving   town    of    modern   aspect    built   in   a 
sheltered  harbor,  with  broad  (iuays,  fine  buildings,  and 
a  gay  parade.      It   was   almost  dark  when   we  entered, 
and  the  brilliant  lights  and  moving  crowds  and  carriages 
formed  a  singular  contrast  to  the  unfinished  scenes  of 
unreg(nerate  nature  which  we  liad  just  left.     The  Noree 
nature,  too,  hard  and  rugged  as  it  may  be,  cannot  resist 
the  effect  of    its  occupations.     Aristotle  ol)servc8  that 
busy  sea  towns   are    always  democratic.     Norway  gen- 
erally,   though    republican,    is    intensely    conservative. 
The  bonders  who  elect   tlic   rcpn'sentativeB  walk   in   tlie 


f^8  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FllOUUE. 

ways  of  their  fathers,  and  have  the  strongest  objection 
to  new  ideas.  Arendal,  1  was  tohl,  sends  to  Parhament 
an  eloquent  yonng  Radical,  the  admired  of  all  the  news- 
papers. There  is,  I  believe,  no  likelihood  that  he  will 
bring  about  a  revolution.  But  there  is  no  knowing, 
when  the  king  is  an  absentee.  We  spent  one  night  at 
Arendal.  In  the  morning  the  storm  had  left  us,  and 
before  sunset  we  were  at  anchor  at  Christiania.  It  was 
Sunday.  The  weather  was  warm,  the  water  smooth, 
the  woody  islands  which  surround  and  shelter  the 
anchorage  were  glowing  in  gold  and  crimson,  Chris- 
tiania, a  city  of  domes  and  steeples,  lay  before  us  with 
its  fleets  of  steamers  and  crowded  shipphig.  Hundreds 
of  tiny  yachts  and  pleasure-boats  were  glancing  round 
us.  There  is  no  sour  Sabbatarianism  in  Norway.  One  of 
the  islands  is  a  kind  of  Cremorne.  When  night  fell 
the  music  of  the  city  band  came  floating  over  the  water  ; 
bine  lights  blazed  and  rockets  flashed  into  the  sky  with 
their  flights  of  crimson  stars.  It  was  a  scene  which  we 
had  not  expected  in  these  northern  I'egions  ;  but  life  can 
have  its  enjoyments  even  above  the  sixtieth  parallel. 

There  is  much  to  be  seen  in  Christiania.  There  is  a 
Parliament  house  and  a  royal  palace,  and  picture-galleries 
and  botanical  gardens,  and  a  museum  of  antiquities,  and 
shops  where  articles  of  native  workmanship  can  be 
bought  l:)y  Englishmen  at  three  times  their  value,  and 
ancient  swords  and  battle-axes,  and  drinking-horns  and 
rings  and  necklaces,  genuine,  at  present,  for  all  I  know 
to  the  contrary,  but  capable  of  imitation,  and  likely  in 
these  days  of  progress  to  be  speedily  imitated.  If  the 
holy  coat  of  Troves  has  been  multiplied  by  ten,  why 
should  there  not  be  ten  swords  of  Olaf  Tryggveson  ? 
But  all  these  things  are  written  of  in  the  hand-book  of 
Mr.  Murray,  where  the  curious  can  read  of  them.     One 


THE    NORWAY    F.IORDS.  09 

real  wonder  we  saw  and  saw  again  at  Cliristiania,  and 
could  not  satisfy  ourselves  with  seeing  ;  and  with  an 
account  of  this  I  shall  end.  It  was  a  viking's  ship  ;  an 
authentic  vessel  in  which,  while  Norway  was  still 
heathen,  before  St.  Olaf  drilled  his  people  into  Chris- 
tianity with  sword  and  gallows,  a  JS'orse  chief  and  his 
erew  had  travelled  these  same  waters,  and  in  which, 
when  he  died,  he  had  been  laid  to  rest.  It  had  been 
covered  in  with  clay  which  had  preserved  the  timbers. 
It  had  been  recovered  almost  entire — the  vessel  itself, 
the  oars,  the  boats,  the  remnants  of  the  cordage,  even 
down  to  the  copper  cauldron  in  which  he  and  his  men 
had  cooked  their  dinners  ;  the  names,  the  age,  the 
character  of  them  all  buried  in  the  soil,  but  the  proof 
surviving  that  they  had  been  the  contemporaries  and 
countrymen- of  the  "Danes"  who  drove  the  EngHsh 
Alfred  into  the  marshes  of  Somersetshire. 

Our  yacht's  company  were  as  eager  to  see  this  ex- 
traordinary relic  as  ourselves.  We  went  in  a  body,  and 
never  tired  of  going.  It  had  been  found  fifty  miles 
away,  had  been  brought  to  Cliristiania,  and  had  been 
given  in  charge  to  the  university.  A  solid  weather- 
proof shed  had  been  built  for  it  where  we  could  study 
its  structure  at  our  leisure. 

The  first  thing  which  struck  us  all  M'as  the  beauty  of 
the  model,  as  little  resembling  the  old  drawings  of  Norse 
or  Saxon  ships  as  the  figures  which  do  duty  there  as  men 
resemble  human  beings.  White,  of  Cowes,  could  not 
buiUl  a  vessel  with  finer  lines,  or  offering  less  resistance 
to  the  water.  She  was  eighty  feet  long  and  seventeen 
and  a  lialf  feet  beam.  She  may  have  drawn  three  feet, 
scarcely  more,  when  her  whole  complement  was  on  board. 
She  was  pierced  for  thirty-two  oars,  and  you  could  see 
the  marks  on  the  side  of  t^e  rowlocks  where  the  oars 


lUO  SKETCHES    FIIOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

had  worn  tlie  timber.  Slie  liad  a  single  mast,  stepped 
in  the  solid  trunk  of  a  tree,  wliicli  had  been  laid  along 
the  keel.  Her  knee  timbers  were  strong  ;  but  her 
planks  were  unexpectedly  slight,  scarcely  more  than 
lialf  an  inch  thick.  They  had  been  formed  by  careful 
splitting  ;  there  is  no  sign  of  the  action  of  a  saw,  and 
the  ends  of  them  had  been  trinnned  off  by  the  axe. 
They  had  been  set  on  and  fastened  with  iron  nails,  and 
the  seams  had  been  carefully  calked.  Deck  she  had 
none — a  level  floor  a  couple  of  feet  below  the  gunwale 
ran  from  stem  to  stern.  The  shields  of  the  crew  formed  a 
bulwark,  and  it  was  easy  to  see  where  they  had  been  fixed. 
Evidently,  therefore,  she  had  been  a  war-ship  ;  built  for 
fighting,  not  carrying  cargoes.  But  there  was  no  shelter, 
and  could  have  been  none  ;  no  covered  forecastles,  no 
stern  cabin.  She  stood  right  open  fore  and  aft  to  wind 
and  waves  ;  and  though  she  would  have  been  buoyant  in 
a  seaway  and  in  the  heaviest  gale  would  have  shipped 
little  water,  even  Norsemen  could  not  have  been  made 
of  such  impenetrable  stuff  that  they  would  have  faced 
the  elements  with  no  better  protection  in  any  distant 
expedition.  That  those  who  sailed  in  her  were  to  some 
extent  careful  of  themselves  is  accidentally  certain. 
Among  the  stores  was  a  plank  with  crossbars  nailed 
upon  it,  meant  evidently  for  landing  on  a  beach.  One 
of  our  men,  who  was  quick  at  inferences,  exclaimed  at 
once  :  "  These  fellows  must  have  worn  shoes  and  stock- 
ings. If  they  had  been  barelegged  they  would  have 
jumped  overboard  and  would  not  have  wanted  a  landing- 
plank." 

I  conclude,  therefore,  that  she  was  not  the  kind  of 
vessel  of  which  the  summer  squadrons  were  composed 
that  came  down  the  English  Channel,  but  that  she  was 
intended  either  for  the  fjords  only,  or  for  the  narrow 


THE   NORWAY   FJORDS,  101 

waters  between  Norway  and  Sweden  and  Denmark  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Baltic.  Her  rig  must  have  been  pre- 
cisely what  we  had  been  lately  seeing  on  the  Sogne  or 
Hai'danger  ;  a  single  large  sail  on  a  square  yard  tit  for 
running  before  the  wind,  or  with  the  wind  slightly  on 
the  quarter,  but  useless  at  a  closer  point.  The  rudder 
Jiung  over  the  side  a  few  feet  from  the  stern,  a  heavy 

^;oar  with  a  broad  blade  and  a  short   handle,  shaped  so 
exactly  like  the  rudders  of  the  Roman  vessels  on  Tra- 

'j^n's  column  that  the  Norsemen,  it  is  likely,  had  seen 

"  the  pattern  somewhere  and  copied  it. 

Such  is  this  strange  remnant  of  the  old  days  which 
has  suddenly  started  into  life.  So  vivid  is  the  impres- 
sion which  it  creates  that  it  is  ahnost  as  if  some  Sweyn 
or  Harold  in  his  proper  person  had  come  back  among  us 
from  the  giave.  If  we  were  actually  to  see  such  a  man 
we  should  be  less  conscious  perhaps  of  our  personal  su- 
periority than  we  are  apt  to  imagine.  A  law  of  com- 
pensation follows  us  through  our  intellectual  and  me- 
chanical progress.  The  race  collectively  knoM's  and  can 
execute  immeasurably  greater  things  than  the  Norsemen. 
Individually  they  may  have  been  as  i*eady  and  intelligent 
as  ourselves.  The  shipwright  certainly  who  laid  the  lines 
of  the  viking's  galley  would  have  something  to  teach  as 
well  as  to  learn  in  the  yard  of  a  modern  yacht-builder. 

But  enough  now  of  Norway.  Our  time  was  out  ;  our 
tour  was  over  ;  we  seated  ourselves  once  more  on  our 
wishing  carpet,  and  desired  to  be  at  Cowcs  ;  we  were 
transported  thither,  with  the  care  and  almost  the  speed 
with  which  the  genius  of  the  lamp  transported  the 
palace  of  Ahiddin  ;  and  we  felt  that  we  had  one  sujie- 
riority  at  least  which  the  viking  would  have  envied  us. 


III. 

A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF    THE    SECOND 
CENTURY.* 

In  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  we  meet  with  a  class  of 
persons  whose  features  have  in  our  own  times  become 
again  familiar  to  us— quacks  and  conjurers  professing  to 
be  in  communication  with  the  spiritual  world,  and  re- 
garded with  curiosity  and  interest  by  serious  men  high 
in  rank  and  authority.  Sergiiis  Paulus  was  craving  for 
any  light  which  could  be  given  him,  and  in  default  of 
better  teaching  had  listened  to  Elymas  the  Sorcerer. 
Simon  Magus,  if  we  may  credit  Catholic  tradition,  was 
in  favor  at  the  Imperial  Court  of  Rome,  where  he 
matched  his  power  against  St.  Peter's,  and  was  defeated 
only  because  God  was  stronger  than  the  devil.  The 
"  curious  arts"  of  these  people  were  regarded  both  by 
Christian  and  heathen  as  a  real  mastery  of  a  super- 
natural secret  ;  and  in  the  hunger  for  information  about 
the  great  mystery  with  which  the  whole  society  was 
possessed,  they  rose,  many  of  them,  into  positions  of 
extraordinary  influence  and  consequence.  Asia  Minor 
seems  to  have  been  their  chief  breeding  ground,  where 
Eastern  magic  came  in  contact  with  Greek  civilization, 

*  We  shall  never  be  free  from  the  danger  of  imposture.  There 
are  many  signs  of  a  revival  of  miracle-mongering  in  the  name  of 
Christianity.  This  essay  w\\\  be  found  a  valuable  preparation  for 
the  study  of  any  evidence  presented  by  the  new  school  of  thauma- 


turgists.  — Editok. 


A    CAGLIOSTKO    Ul"   THE    SECOXD    CENTL'KY.  103 

and  imposture  was  able  to  disguise  itself  in  the  phrases 
of  philosophy. 

Apollonius  of  Tyana  "^vas  the  most  remarkable  of  these 
adventui'ers.  His  life,  unfortunately,  has  been  written 
by  believers  in  his  pretensions  ;  and  we  have  no  knowl- 

^.-edge  of  what  he  looked  like  to  cool  observers.  The 
Apollonius  of  Philostratus  is  a  heathen  saviour,  who 
claimed  a  commission  from  heaven  to  teach  a  pure  and 
reformed  religion,  and  in  attestation  of  his  authority 
,went  about  healing  the  sick,  raising  dead  men   to  life, 

-casting  out  devils,  and  prophesying  future  events  which 
came  afterward  to  pass.  The  interesting  fact  about 
Apollonius   is  the  extensive  recognition  which    he    ob- 

^tained,  and  the  ease  with  which  his  pretensions  found 
aiCceptance  in  the  existing  condition  of  the  j)opular  mind. 
Out  of  the  legends  of  him  little  can  be  gathered,  save 
the  barest  outline  of  his  history.  He  was  born  four 
years  before  the  Christian  era  in  Tyana,  a  city  of  Cap- 
padocia.  His  parents  sent  him  to  be  educated  at  Tarsus 
in  Cilicia,  a  place  of  considerable  wealth  and  repute,  and 
he  nmst  have  been  about  beginning  his  studies  there 
when  St.  Paul  as  a  little  boy  was  first  running  about  the 
streets.  The  life  in  Tarsus  being  too  luxurious  for 
Apollonius's  aspirations,  he  became  a  water-drinker  and 
a  vegetarian,  and  betook  himself  as  a  recluse  to  the 
temple  of  ^Esculapius  at  ^gae.  ^sculapius,  as  the 
god  of  liealing,  and  therefore  the  most  practically  use- 
ful, had  l)ecome  the  most  popular  of  the  heathen  divin- 
ities. He  alone  of  them  was  supposed  to  remain  be- 
neficently active,  and  even  to  appear  at  times  in  visible 
form  in  sick-rooms  and  by  sick-beds,  Apollonius's  de- 
votion to  ^Esculapius  means  that  he  studied  medicine. 
On  the  death  of  his  father  he  divided  his  i)roperty 
among  the  poor,  and  after  five   years  of  retirement  ho 


104  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

travelled  as  far  as  India  in  search  of  knowledge.  He 
discoursed  witli  learned  Brahmins  there,  and  came  home 
with  enlightened  ideas,  and  with  some  skill  in  the  arts 
of  the  Indian  jugglers.  With  these  two  possessions  he 
began  his  career  as  a  teacher  in  the  Roman  Empire. 
He  preached  his  new  religion,  and  he  worked  miracles 
to  induce  people  to  believe  in  him.  He  was  at  Rome 
in  Nero's  time,  when  Simon  Magus  and  St.  Peter  are 
said  to  have  been  there.  Perhaps  tradition  has  con- 
fused Apollonius  with  Simon  Magus,  or  Simon  Magus 
with  Apollonius.  In  the  convulsions  which  followed 
Nero's  murder,  being  then  an  old  man,  he  attached 
himself  to  Yespasian  in  Egypt.  Vespasian,  who  was 
not  without  his  superstitions,  and  himself  had  been  once 
persuaded  to  work  a  miracle,  is  said  to  have  looked 
kindly  on  him  and  patronized  him,  and  Apollonius 
blossomed  out  into  glory  as  the  spiritual  adviser  of 
the  Yespasian  d}Tiasty.  The  cruelties  of  Domitian 
estranged  him.  He  was  accused  of  conspiring  with 
Nerva,  and  of  having  sacrificed  a  child  to  bribe  the  gods 
in  Nerva's  interest.  He  was  even  charged  with  having 
pretended  to  be  a  god  himself.  He  was  arraigned,  con- 
victed, and  was  about  to  suffer,  when  he  vanished  out  of 
the  hands  of  the  Roman  police,  to  reappear  at  Ephesus, 
where  he  soon  after  died. 

Clearly  enough,  we  are  off  the  ground  of  history  in 
much  of  this.  If  Apollonius  died  at  Ephesus  in  Nerva's 
time,  he  was  a  hundred  years  old  at  least,  and  must  have 
been  a  contemporary  and  neighbor  of  St.  John,  who  is 
supposed  to  have  been  writing  his  Gospel  in  the  same 
city  about  that  very  time. 

However  that  may  be,  it  is  certain  that  after  his  death 
a  temple  was  raised  to  Apollonius  at  the  place  of  his 
birth,   and  Tyana  became    a   privileged  city.     Similar 


A   CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SECOND    CENTURY.  105 

honors  were  assigned  elsewhere  to  liini  as  an  evidence  of 
the  facility  and  completeness  with  which  he  had  gained 
credit  for  his  pretended  divine  commission.  The  truth 
about  liim  is  probably  that  he  was  a  physician,  and  had 
obtained  some  real  knowledge  of  the  methods  of  curing 

'tiiseases.  In  India,  besides  philosophy  and  juggling,  he 
may  have  learned  to  practice  what  is  now  called  animal 

•'magnetism  ;  and  finding  that  he  had  a  real  power  on 
the.  nerv'oas  system  of  hysterical  patients,  the  nature  of 
wliich  he  did  not  understand,  he  may  have  himself 
l)elieved  it  to  be  supernatural.  With  these  arts  he 
succeeded  in  persuading  his  countrymen  that  he  was 
"  some  great  one,"  "  a  great  power  of  God  ;"  and  both 
in  life  and  death,  in  an  age  when  the  traditionary 
r^liffion  was  grown  incredible,  and  the  human  race  was 
craving  for«.a  new  revelation,  ApoUonius  of  Tyana, 
among  many  others,  was  looked  upon  through  a  large 
part  of  the  Roman  Empire  as  an  emanation  of  the 
Divine  nature.  Such  periods  are  the  opportunities  of 
false  prophets.  Mankind  when  they  grow  enthusiastic 
mistake  their  hopes  and  imaginations  for  evidence  of 
truth,  and  run  like  sheep  after  every  new  pretender  who 
professes  to  hold  the  key  of  the  mystery  which  they  are 
80  passionately  anxious  to  penetrate. 

Our  present  business,  however,  is  not  with  the  prophet 
of  Tyana.  ApoUonius  left  a  school  of  esoteric  disciples 
behind  him,  with  one  of  whom  we  are  fortunately  able 
to  form  a  closer  acquaintance.  ApoUonius  we  see  through 
a  mist  of  illusion.  Alexander  of  Abonotichus  we  are 
able  to  look  at  with  the  eyes  of  the  cleverest  man  who 
was  alive  on  this  planet  in  the  second  century.  With 
the  help  of  Lucian's  portrait  of  Alexander  we  can  dis- 
cern, perhaps,  the  lineaments  of  A])ollonius  himself. 
We  can  see,  at  any  rate,  what  these  workere  of  miracles 


106  SKETCHES   FROM    J.   A.   PROUDE. 

really  were,  as  well  as  tlie  nature  of  the  element  in 
which  the}'  made  their  conquests,  at  the  side  of,  and  in 
open  rivalry  with,  the  teachers  of  Christianity. 

A  word  tirst  about  Lucian  himself.  At  the  Christian 
era,  and  immediately  after  it,  the  Asiatic  provinces  of 
the  Empire  were  singularly  productive  of  eminent  men. 
The  same  intercourse  of  Eastern  and  Western  civilization 
which  produced  the  magicians  was  generating  in  all 
directions  an  active  intellectual  fermentation.  The 
"disciples"  were  "called  Christians  first  at  Antioch." 
It  was  in  Asia  Minor  that  St.  Paul  first  established  a 
Gentile  Church.  There  sprang  up  the  multitude  of 
heresies  out  of  conflict  with  which  the  Christian  creeds 
shaped  themselves.  And  by  the  side  of  those  who  were 
constructing  a  positive  faith  were  found  others,  who 
were  watching  the  phenomena  round  them  w^ith  an 
anxious  but  seve?*e  scepticism,  unable  themselves  to  find 
truth  in  the  agitating  speculations  which  were  distract- 
ing everybody  that  came  near  them,  but  with  a  clear 
eye  to  distinguish  knaves  and  impostors,  and  a  resolution 
as  honorable  as  St.  Paul's  to  fight  with  and  expose 
falsehood  wherever  they  encountered  it.  Among  these 
the  most  admirable  was  the  satirist,  artist,  man  of  letters, 
the  much-spoken-of  and  little-studied  Lucian,  the  most 
gifted  and  perha23s  the  purest-hearted  thinker  outside 
the  Church  who  w^as  produced  under  the  Roman  Empire. 
He  was  born  at  Samosata  on  the  Euphrates  about  the 
year  120.  lie  was  intended  for  a  sculptor,  but  his  quick 
discursive  intellect  led  him  into  a  wider  held,  and  he 
spent  his  life  as  a  critic  of  the  sj)iritual  phenomena  of  his 
age.  To  Christianity  he  paid  little  attention.  To  him 
it  appeared  but  as  one  of  the  many  phases  of  behef 
which  were  showing  themselves  among  the  ignorant 
and    uneducated.      But   it  was    harmless,    and   he    did 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SECOXD   CENTITRT.  107 

not  quarrel  with  it.  He  belonged  to  the  small  circle 
of  observers  who  looked  on  such  things  with  the  ejes  of 
men  of  science.  Cool-headed,  and  with  an  honest  hatred 
of  Hes,  he  ridicnled  the  impious  theology  of  the  estab- 
lished pagan  religion  ;  with  the  same  instinct  he  attacked 
the  charlatans  who  came,  like  Apollonius,  pretending  to 
a  Divine  commission.  He  was  doing  the  Church's  work 
when  he  seemed  most  distant  from  it,  and  was  strug- 
gling against  illusions  peculiarly  seductive  to  the  class  of 
minds  to  whom  the  Church  particularly  addressed  itself. 
Thus  to  Lucian  we  are  indebted  for  cross  lights  upon 
the  history  of  times  which  show  us  how  and  why  at  that 
particular  period  Christianity  was  able  to  establish  itself. 
Jlis  scientific  contemporaries  were  more  antagonistic  to 
it,  Ifhan  himself.  The  Celsus  against  whom  Origen  wrote 
his  great  defence  was  probably  Lucian's  intimate  friend. 
But  if  Christianity  M^as  incredible  and  offensive  to  them, 
men  Kke  Apollonius  of  Tyana  were  infinitely  more 
offensive.  Christianity  was  at  most  a  delusion.  Apol- 
lonius of  Tyana  they  hated  as  a  quack  and  a  scoundrel. 
Besides  the  treatise  which  Origen  answered,  Celsus 
wrote  a  book  against  the  magicians.  Lucian  sjDeaks  of 
Apollonius  in  a  letter  to  Celsus  as  if  they  were  both 
agreed  about  the  character  of  the  pro])het  of  Tyana,  and 
had  this  book  surdved  we  should  have  perhaps  found  a 
second  picture  there  of  Apollonius,  which  would  have 
made  impossible  the  rash  parallels  which  have  been 
attempted  in  modern  times.  The  companion  picture  of 
Alexander  of  Abonotichus,  by  Lucian  himself,  happily 
remains.  When  the  world  was  Ijowing  down  before 
this  extraordinary  rascal,  Lucian  traced  out  his  history, 
and  risked  his  own  life  in  trying  to  explode  the  im- 
posture. Though  human  folly  proved  too  strong,  and 
Alexander  died  like  Apollonius,  with  the  supornatural 


108  SKETCHES   FROM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

aureole  ii])Out  liim,  Lncian,  at  the  express  desire  of 
Celsus,  i^laced  on  record  a  minute  account  of  the  man, 
hicid  to  the  smallest  detail.  He  describes  him  as  a 
servant  of  the  devil,  in  the  most  modern  sense  of  the 
word — not  of  the  prince  of  the  power  of  the  air,  as  a 
Christian  Father  would  have  described  him,  with  evil 
genii  at  his  bidding,  but  of  the  devil  of  lying  and  impost- 
ure with  whom  nowadays  we  are  so  sadly  familiar.  He 
commences  with  an  apology  for  touching  so  base  a 
subject  ;  he  undertakes  it  only  at  his  friend's  request. 
'Nor  can  he  tell  the  entire  story.  Alexander  of  Abo- 
uotichus  was  as  great  in  rascaldom  as  Alexander  of 
Macedon  in  war  and  politics.  His  exploits  would  fill 
large  volumes,  and  the  most  which  Lucian  could  do  was 
to  select  a  few  basketfuls  from  the  dungheap  and  offer 
them  as  specimens.  Even  thus  much  he  feels  a  certain 
shame  in  attempting.  If  the  wretch  had  received  his 
true  deserts,  he  would  have  been  torn  in  pieces  by  apes 
and  foxes  in  the  arena,  and  the  very  name  of  him  would 
have  been  blotted  out  of  memory.  Biographies,  how- 
ever, had  been  written,  and  had  given  pleasure,  of  dis- 
tinguished highwaymen  ;  and  an  account  of  a  man  who 
had  plundered,  not  a  small  district,  but  the  whole 
Koman  Empire,  might  not  be  without  its  uses. 

With  these  few  words  of  contemptuous  preface  Lucian 
tells  his  story  ;  and  in  a  form  still  more  abridged  we 
now  offer  it  to  our  readers. 

Abonotichus  was  a  small  coast  town  on  the  south  shore 
of  the  Black  Sea,  a  few  miles  west  of  Sinope.  At  this 
place,  at  the  beginning  of  the  second  century,  the  future 
prophet  was  brought  into  the  world.  His  parents  were 
in  a  humble  rank  of  life.  The  boy  was  of  unusual 
beauty  ;  and  having  no  inclination  to  work  and  a  very 
strong  inclination  for  pleasure,  he  turned  his  advantages 


A.    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SECOND    CRNTURY.  109 

to  abominable  account.  B}'  and  by  he  was  taken  up  by 
a  doctor  who  had  been  one  of  Apollonins's  disciples. 
The  old  villain  had  learned  his  master's  arts.  He 
understood  medicine,  could  cure  stomachaches  and  head- 
aches, set  a  limb,  or  assist  at  a  lying-in.  But  besides  his 
legitimate  capabilities,  he  had  set  up  for  a  magician.  He 
dealt  in  spells  and  love-charms  ;  he  could  find  treasures 
with  a  divining  rod,  discover  lost  deeds  and  wills,  pro- 
vide, heirs  for  disputed  inheritances,  and,  when  well 
paid  for  it,  he  knew  how  to  mix  a  poison.  In  these  arts 
the  young  Alexander  became  an  apt  pupil,  and  was 
useful  as  a  sort  oi  famulus.  lie  learned  Apollonins's 
traditionary  secrets,  and  at  the  age  of  twenty,  when  his 
master  died,  he  was  in  a  condition  to  practise  on  his 
own  account. 

He  was  now  thrown  on  the  world  to  shift  for  himself. 
But  his  spirits  were  light,  and  his  confidence  in  himself 
M'as  boundless  :  as  long  as  there  were  fools  with  money 
in  their  pockets,  he  could  have  a  well-founded  hope  of 
transferring  part  of  it  to  his  own.  A  provincial  town 
was  too  small  a  theatre  of  operations.  He  set  off  for 
Byzantium,  the  great  mart  of  ancient  commerce,  which 
was  thronged  with  merchants  from  all  parts  of  the 
world.  Like  seeks  like.  At  Byzantium,  Alexander 
made  acquaintance  with  a  vagabond  named  Cocconas, 
a  fellow  who  gained  a  living  hy  foretelling  the  winners 
at  games  and  races,  lounging  in  the  betting  rings,  and 
gambling  with  idle  young  gentlemen.  By  this  means 
he  found  entrance  into  what  was  called  society.  Al- 
exander was  more  beautiful  as  a  man  than  as  a  boy. 
Cocconas  introduced  hitn  to  a  rich  Macedonian  lady, 
who  was  spending  the  season  in  the  city.  The  lady  fell 
in  love  with  him,  and,  on  her  return  to  her  country  seat 
at  Bella,  carried  Alexander  and  his  friend  along  with 


no  SKETCHES    FllOir    J,   A.   FROUDE, 

her.  This  was  very  well  for  a  time  ;  but  the  situation, 
perhaps,  had  its  drawbacks.  Aspiring  ambition  is  not 
easily  satisfied  ;  and  the  young  heart  began  to  sigh  for  a 
larger  sphere. 

In  the  midst  of  pleasure  he  had  an  eye  for  business. 
In  Macedonia,  and  especially  about  Pella,  there  was  at 
this  time  a  great  number  of  large  harmless  snakes. 
They  came  into  the  houses,  where  they  were  useful  in 
keeping  down  rats  and  mice  ;  they  let  the  children  play 
with  them  ;  they  crept  into  beds  at  night,  and  were 
never  interfered  with.  From  this  local  peculiarity  the 
story,  perliajjs,  originated  of  the  miraculous  birth  of 
Alexander  the  Great.  It  occurred  to  the  two  adven- 
turers that  something  might  be  made  of  one  of  these 
serpents.  They  bought  a  very  handsome  specimen,  and 
soon  after  they  left  Pella,  taking  it  with  them. 

For  a  while  they  lounged  about  together,  carrying  on 
Cocconas's  old  trade,  and  expanding  it  into  fortune-tell- 
ing. Fools,  they  observed,  were  always  craving  to  know 
the  future,  and  would  listen  to  any  one  who  pretended  to 
see  into  it.  In  this  way  they  made  much  money,  and 
they  found  the  art  so  easy  that  their  views  went  higher. 
They  proposed  to  set  up  an  oracular  shrine  of  their  own, 
which  would  take  the  place  of  Delphi  and  Delos.  The 
jjythonesses  on  the  old-established  tripods  were  growing 
silent.  Apollo,  it  seemed,  was  tired  of  attending  them, 
and  incpiirers  were  often  sent  away  unsatisfied.  There 
was  clearly  a  want  in  the  world,  and  Alexander  and  his 
friend  thought  they  saw  their  way  toward  supplying  it 

The  loss  of  oracles  w^as  not  the  whole  of  the  misfor- 
tune. The  world  was  beginning  to  feel  that  it  had  even 
lost  God.  The  Greek  mythology  had  grown  incredible. 
The  Epicureans  were  saying  that  there  was  no  such 
thing  as  Providence,  and  never  had  been.     The  majority 


A    CAGLIOSTIIO   OF    THE    SECOND    CENTURY.  Ill 

of  people  were  still  of  a  different  opinion  ;  but  tliey 
were  uneasy,  and  were  feeling  very  generally  indeed 
that  if  gods  there  were,  they  ought  to  make  their  exist- 
ence better  known.  Here  was  an  opportunity,  not  only 
of  making  a  fortune,  but  of  vindicating  the  great  prin- 
ciples of  religion  and  becoming  benefactors  of  humanity. 
-They  decided  to  try.  Sleight  of  hand  and  cunning 
mivht  succeed  when  philosophy  liad  failed.  Was  it 
said,  there  were  no  gods  ?  They  would  produce  a  god,  a 
rdal  visible  god,  that  men  could  feel  and  handle,  that 
would  itself  speak  and  give  out  oracles,  and  so  silence 
forever  the  wicked  unbelievers.  So  far  they  saw  their 
way.  The  next  question  was,  the  place  where  the  god 
was  to  appear.  Cocconas  was  for  Chalcedon,  on  the 
Asiatic  side  of  the  Bosphorus.  It  was  a  busy  town, 
almost  as  fulLof  merchants  as  Byzantium,  the  population 
all  engaged  with  speculation,  and  money  in  any  quantity 
to  be  made  there.  This  was  good  as  far  as  it  went.  But 
Chalcedon  was  too  nnu'h  in  the  light.  The  pagan  gods, 
as  the  shrewder  Alexander  knew,  were  not  fond  of  com- 
mercial cities.  Christianity  might  thrive  there  ;  but 
caves,  mountains,  and  woods,  remote  islands,  retired 
provincial  villages,  suited  better  with  Apollo  and 
yEsculapius.  Traders'  wits  were  sharpened  with  busi- 
ness, and  they  might  be  unpleasantly  curious.  The 
simple  inhabitants  of  the  interior,  Phrygians  and  Bithy- 
nians,  Galatians  and  Cappadocians,  would  be  an  easier 
prey  where  a  reputation  had  first  to  be  created — and 
success  depended  upon  a  favorable  beginning.  At  his 
own  Abonotichus,  he  told  Cocconas  that  a  man  had  only 
to  appear  with  a  fife  and  drum  before  him,  and  clashing 
a  pair  of  cymbals,  and  the  whole  population  would  be 
on  their  knees  before  hiiii. 

The  better  judgment  of    Alexander  curried  the  day. 


112  SKETCHES   FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

Abonoticlms  itself  was  decided  on  as  the  tlieatre  of 
operations.  Cocconas,  liowever,  was  allowed  to  intro- 
duce Chalcedon  into  the  first  act  of  the  drama.  yEscula- 
piiis,  the  best  believed  in  of  the  surviving  divinities, 
was  the  god  who  was  to  be  incarnated.  Joe  Smith  must 
have  read  Lucian's  story,  and  have  taken  a  liint  from  it. 
In  the  temple  of  Apollo  at  Chalcedon  the  bold  adven- 
turers buried  some  brass  plates,  bearing  an  inscription 
that  Apollo  and  .^Esculapius  were  about  to  visit  Pontus, 
and  that  yEsculapius  would  apjDcar  at  Abonotichus  in  a 
bodily  form.  The  plates  were  conveniently  discovered, 
and  became  the  talk  of  the  bazaars.  Merchants  going 
and  coming  spread  the  story.  Asia  Minor  was  excited, 
as  well  it  might  be.  At  the  favored  Abonotichus  the 
delighted  people  resolved  to  build  a  temple  to  receive 
the  god  at  his  coming,  and  they  set  to  work  at  once, 
clearing  the  ground  for  the  foundations. 

The  train  being  thus  well  laid,  Alexander  had  no 
further  need  of  a  companion.  Cocconas  was  a  vulgar 
type  of  rogue,  unfit  for  the  decorous  hypocrisies  which 
were  now  to  be  acted.  He  was  left  behind  on  some 
pretext  at  Chalcedon,  where  he  died,  it  was  said  from  a 
snake-bite,  and  so  drops  out  of  sight.  The  supreme 
performer  returned,  with  tlie  field  to  himself,  to  his 
native  town.  Lucian  describes  him  as  he  then  ap- 
peared :  tall,  majestic,  extremely  handsome,  hair  long 
and  flowing,  complexion  fair,  a  moderate  beard,  partly 
his  own  and  partly  false,  but  the  imitation  excellent, 
eyes  large  and  lustrous,  and  a  voice  sweet  and  limpid. 
As  to  his  character,  says  Lucian,  "  God  grant  that  I 
may  never  meet  with  such  another.  His  cunning  was 
wonderful,  his  dexterity  matchless.  His  eagerness  for 
knowledge,  his  capacity  for  learning,  and  power  of 
memory  were  equally  extraordinary." 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF    THE    SECOND    CEXTURY.  113 

The  simple  citizens  of  Abonoticlius,  on  the  watch 
ah-eadj  for  the  coming  of  a  god  among  them,  had  no 
chance  against  so  capable  a  villain.  They  had  not  seen 
him  since  the  wonderful  days  of  his  boyhood,  when  he 
had  been  known  as  the  famulus  of  an  old  wizard.  He 
jiow  presented  himself  among  them,  his  locks  wildly 
streaming,  in  a  purple  tunic,  with  a  white  cloak  thrown 
p'^er  it.  In  his  hand  he  bore  a  falchion  like  that  with 
which  Perseus  had  slain  the  Gorgon.  He  chanted  a 
doggerel  of  Alexandrian  metaphysics,  with  monads  and 
triads,  pentads  and  decads,  playing  in  anagrams  upon  his 
own  name.  He  had  learned  from  an  oracle,  he  said,  that 
Perseus  was  his  mother's  ancestor,  and  that  a  wonderful 
destiny  had  been  foretold  for  him.  He  rolled  his 
beautiful  soft  eyes.  With  the  help  of  soapwort  he 
foamed  at  the  mouth  as  if  possessed.  The  poor  people 
had  known  his  mother,  and  had  no  conception  of  her 
illustrious  lineage.  But  there  was  no  disputing  with  an 
oracle.  What  an  oracle  said  must  be  true.  He  was 
received  with  an  ovation,  all  the  town  bowing  down 
before  him,  and  he  then  prepared  for  his  next  step. 

The  snake  throughout  the  East  was  the  symbol  of 
knowledge  and  immortality.  The  serpent  with  his  tail 
in  his  mouth  represented  the  circle  of  eternity.  The 
serpent  in  annually  shedding  its  skin  was  supposed  to 
renew  its  life  forever.  A  sect  even  of  Gnostic  Chris- 
tians were  serpent-worshippers.  From  the  time  of  the 
brazen  serpent  in  tlie  wilderness,  it  was  the  s])ecial 
emblem  of  the  art  of  healing  ;  and  if  the  divine  phy- 
sician ever  appeared  on  earth  in  visible  shape,  a  snake'a 
was  the  form  which  he  might  be  expected  to  assume. 

The  snake  which  had  been  bouglit  at  Pella  was  now 
to  be  applied  to  its  purpose.  The  monster,  for  it  was  of 
enormous  size,  had  accompanied  Alexander  througii  his 


114  SKETCHKS    FKOM    .1.    A.   FROUDE. 

subsequent  adventures.  Tt  Iiad  become  so  tame  that  it 
would  coil  about  bis  body,  and  remain  in  any  position 
wliicli  he  desired.  He  had  made  a  human  face  out  of 
linen  for  it,  which  he  had  painted  with  extreme  in- 
t^enuity.  The  mouth  would  open  and  shut  by  an  ar- 
rangement of  horse-hair.  The  black  forked  tongue  shot 
in  and  out,  and  the  creature  liad  grown  accustomed  to  its 
mask  and  wore  it  without  objection. 

A  full-grown  divinity  being  thus  ready  at  hand,  tlie 
intending  prophet  next  furnished  himself  with  the  egg 
of  a  goose,  opened  it,  cleared  out  the  contents,  and  placed 
inside  a  small  embryo  snake  just  born.  This  done  he 
filled  the  cracks  and  smoothed  them  over  with  wax  and 
white  lead.  ^Esculapius's  temple  was  meanwhile  mak- 
ing progress.  The  foundations  had  been  dug,  and  there 
were  pits  and  holes,  which  a  recent  rain  had  filled  with 
water.  In  one  of  these  muddy  pools  Alexander  con- 
cealed his  egg,  as  he  had  done  the  plates  at  Chalcedon, 
and  the  next  morning  he  rushed  into  the  market-place 
in  a  state  of  frenzy,  almost  naked,  a  girdle  of  gold  tissue 
about  his  waist,  hair  streaming,  eyes  flashing,  mouth 
foann'ng,  and  the  Perseus  falchion  wheeling  about  his 
head.  The  crowd  collected,  at  the  sight  of  him,  frantic 
as  hiinself.  He  sprang  upon  some  mound  or  bench. 
"Blessed,"'  he  cj-ied,  "be  this  town  of  x\bonotichus, 
and  blessed  be  they  that  dwell  in  it  !  This  day  the 
prophecy  is  fulfilled,  and  God  is  coming  to  take  his  place 
among  us." 

The  entire  population  was  out,  old  and  young,  men 
and  women,  quivering  with  hope  and  emotion.  Alex- 
ander made  an  oration  in  an  unknown  tongue  ;  some 
said  it  was  Hebrew,  some  Phaniician,  all  agreed  that  it 
was  inspired.  The  only  words  articulately  heard  were 
the   names  of   Apollo  and  ^Esculapius.      When  he  had 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SECOND    CENTURY.  115 

done  lie  set  up  the  familiar  Psalin  of  the  Son  of  God, 
and  moved,  with  the  crowd  singing  in  chorus  behind 
him,  to  the  site  of  the  temple.  He  stepped  into  the 
water,  offered  a  prayer  to  ^Esculapius,  and  then,  asking 
for  a  bowl,  he  scooped  his  egg  out  of  the  mud. 

"  ^sculapius  is  here,"  he  said,  holding  it  for  a 
moment  in  the  hollow  of  his  hand.  And  then,  with 
"<&very  eye  fixed  on  him  in  the  intensity  of  expectation, 
he  broke  it.  The  tiny  creature  twisted  about  his  fingers. 
"  It  moves,  it  moves  I' '  the  people  cried  in  ecstasy. 
Kot  a  question  M-as  asked.  To  doubt  would  have 
been  impious.  They  shouted.  They  blessed  the  gods. 
They  blessed  themselves  for  the  glory  which  they  had 
witnessed.  Health,  wealth,  all  pleasant  things  which 
010  god  could  give,  they  saw  raining  on  the  happy 
Abonotichus.  Alexander  swept  back  to  his  house,  bear- 
ing the  divinity  in  his  bosom,  the  awe-struck  people 
following.  For  a  few  days  there  was  a  pause,  while  the 
tale  of  what  had  happened  spread  along  the  shores  of 
the  Black  Sea.  Then  on  foot,  on  mules,  in  carts,  in 
boats,  multitudes  flocked  in  from  all  directions  to  the 
birthplace  of  J^sculapius.  The  roads  were  choked  with 
them  ;  the  town  overflowed  with  them.  "  They  had 
the  forms  of  men,"  as  Lucian  says,  "  but  they  were  as 
sheep  in  all  besides,  heads  and  hearts  empty  ahke." 
Alexander  was  ready  for  their  reception.  He  had 
erected  a  booth  or  tabernacle,  with  a  door  at  each  end 
and  a  railed  passage  leading  from  one  door  to  the  other. 
Behind  the  rail,  on  a  couch,  in  a  subdued  light,  the 
prophet  sat,  visible  to  every  one,  the  snake  from  Pella 
wreathed  about  his  neck,  the  coils  glittering  amid  the 
folds  of  his  dress,  the  tail  ])laying  on  the  ground.  The 
head  was  concealed  ;  l)ut  occasionally  the  proi)het  raised 
his  arm,  and   then   iippcand    thr  awful    face,  the  mouth 


116  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

inoviiiiT,  the  tongue  darting  in  and  out.  There  it  was, 
the  veritable  traditionary  serpent  with  the  human  coun- 
tenance which  appears  in  the  mediaeval  pictures  of  the 
Temptation  and  the  Fall. 

The  prophet  told  the  spectators  that  into  this  mys- 
terious being  the  embryo  that  was  found  in  the  egg  had 
developed  in  a  few  days.  The  place  was  dark  ;  the 
crowd  which  was  pressing  to  be  admitted  was  enormous. 
The  stream  of  worshippers  passed  quickly  from  door  to 
door.  They  could  but  look  and  give  place  to  others. 
But  a  single  glance  was  enough  for  minds  disposed  to 
believe.  The  rapidity  of  the  creature's  growth,  so  far 
from  exciting  suspicion,  was  only  a  fresh  evidence  of  its 
miraculous  nature.  The  first  exhibition  was  so  successful 
that  others  followed.  The  first  visitors  had  been  chiefly 
the  poor  ;  but  as  the  fame  of  the  appearance  spread, 
the  higher  classes  caught  the  infection.  Men  of  fortune 
came  with  rich  ofEerings  ;  and  so  confident  was  Alexander 
in  their  folly  that  those  who  gave  most  liberally  were 
allowed  to  touch  the  scales  and  to  look  steadily  at  the 
moving  mouth.  So  well  the  trick  was  done  that  Lucian 
says,  "Epicurus  himself  would  have  been  taken  in." 
"  Kothing  could  save  a  man  but  a  mind  with  the  firm- 
ness of  adamant,  and  fortified  by  a  scientific  conviction 
that  the  thing  which  he  supposed  himself  to  see  was  a 
physical  impossibility." 

Tlie  wonder  was  still  imperfect.  The  divinity  was 
there,  but  as  yet  he  had  not  spoken.  The  excitement, 
however,  grew  and  spread.  All  Asia  Minor  was  caught 
with  it.  The  old  stories  were  true  then.  There  were 
gods,  after  all,  and  the  wicked  philosophers  were  wrong. 
Heavy  hearts  were  lifted  up  again.  From  lip  to  lip  the 
blessed  message  flew  ;  over  Galatia,  over  Bithynia,  away 
across  the  Bosphorus,  into  Thrace  and  Macedonia.     A 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SECOND    CENTURY.  117 

god,  a  real  one,  had  been  born  at  Aljonoticlius,  with  a 
serpent's  body  and  the  face  of  a  man.  Pictures  were 
taken  of  liim.  Images  were  made  in  brass  or  silver  and 
circulated  in  thousands.  At  length  it  was  announced 
that  the  lips  had  given  an  articulate  sound. 

"  I  am  Glycon,  the  sweet  one,"  the  creature  had  said, 
"  the  third  in  descent  from  Zeus,  and  the  light  of  the 
world." 

The  temple  M-as  now  linished.  Proper  accommoda- 
tion had  been  provided  for  ^Esculapius  and  his  prophet 
priest  ;  and  a  public  announcement  was  made  that  the 
god,  for  a  fit  consideration,  would  answer  anv  (piestions 
which  might  be  put  to  him.  There  was  a  doubt  at  first 
''about  the  tariif.  Amphilochus,  who  had  migrated  from 
Thebes  to  a  shrine  in  Cilicia,  and  had  been  prophesying 
there  for  ten  centuries,  charged  two  obols,  or  three  pence, 
for  each  oracle  ;  but  money  had  fallen  in  value,  and 
answers  directly  from  a  god  were  in  themselves  of  higher 
worth,  .^sculapius,  or  Alexander  for  him,  demanded 
eight  obols,  or  a  shilling.  Days  and  hours  were  fixed 
when  incpiirers  could  be  received.  They  were  expected 
to  send  in  their  names  beforehand,  and  to  write  their 
questions  on  a  paper  or  parchment,  which  they  might 
seal  up  in  any  way  that  they  pleased.  Alexander  re- 
ceived the  packets  from  their  hands,  and  after  a  day,  or 
sometiines  two  days,  restored  them  with  the  answers  to 
the  questions  attached. 

People  came,  of  course,  in  tliousands.  The  seals 
being  apparently  unbroken,  the  mere  fact  that  an  answer 
was  given  of  some  kind  predisposed  tliem  to  be  satisfied 
with  it.  Either  a  heated  knife-blade  had  been  passed 
under  the  wax,  or  a  cast  of  the  impression  was  taken  in 
collyrium  and  a  new  seal  was  manufactured.  Tho 
obvious    explaiuition    occurred   to    nu    one.      Peo])le    in 


nS  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.   FBOUDE. 

search  of  the  miraculous  never  like  to  be  disappointed. 
Either  they  themselves  betray  their  secrets,  or  they  ask 
questions  so  foolish  that  it  cannot  be  known  whether  the 
answer  is  true  or  false.  Most  of  the  inquirers  came  to 
consult  .Esculapius  al)Out  their  health,  and  Alexander 
knew  medicine  enough  to  be  able  generally  to  read  in 
their  faces  what  was  the  matter  with  them.  Thus  they 
were  easily  satisfied,  and  went  away  as  convinced  as 
when  they  arrived.  Tlie  names  being  given  in  before- 
hand, private  information  was  easily  obtained  from 
slaves  or  companions.  Shrewd  guesses  were  miracles, 
when  they  were  correct,  and  one  success  outweighed  a 
hundred  failures.  In  cases  of  difficulty  the  oracular 
method  was  always  in  reserve,  with  the  ambiguities  of 
magniloquent  nonsense.  The  real  strength  of  Alex- 
ander was  in  his  professional  skill,  which  usually  was  in 
itself  all-sufficient.  He  had  a  special  quack  remedy  of 
his  own,  which  he  prescribed  as  a  panacea,  a  harmless 
plaster  made  out  of  goat's  fat.  To  aspiring  politicians, 
young  lovers,  or  heirs  expectant,  he  replied  that  the 
fates  were  undecided,  and  that  the  event  depended  on 
the  Avill  of  ^Esculapius  and  the  intercessions  of  his 
prophet. 

Xever  was  audacity  greater  or  more  splendidly  re- 
warded. The  gold  ingots  sent  to  Delphi  were  as  noth- 
ing compared  to  the  treasures  which  streamed  into 
Abonotichus.  Each  question  was  sej^arately  paid  for, 
and  ten  or  fifteen  were  not  enough  for  the  curiosity  of 
single  visitors.  The  work  soon  outgrew  the  strength  of 
a  single  man.  The  prophet  had  an  army  of  disciples, 
who  were  munificently  paid.  They  were  employed,  some 
as  servants,  some  as  spies,  oracle  manufacturers,  secre- 
taries, keepers  of  seals,  or  interpreters  of  the  various 
Asiatic  dialects.     Each  applicant  received  his  answer  in 


A    CAGLI03TKO    OF   THE    SECOXI)    CEXTL'RY.  110 

liis  own  tongue,  to  his  Qverwlicliuiiig  admiration.  Suc- 
cess brought  fresh  ambitions  with  it.  Emissaries  were 
dispersed  through  the  Empire  spreading  the  fame  of  the 
new  prophet  ;  instigating  fools  to  consult  the  oracV, 
and  lettinij  Alexander  know  who  thev  were  and  what 
they  wanted.  If  a  slave  had  rmi  away,  if  a  will  could 
not  be  found,  if  a  treasure  had  been  secreted,  if  a  rob- 
bery was  nndiscovered,  Alexander  became  the  universal 
resource.  The  air  M'as  full  of  miracles.  The  sick  were 
healed.  The  dead  were  raised  to  life,  or  were  reported 
and  were  believed  to  have  been  raised,  which  came  to 
the  same  thing.  To  believe  was  a  duty,  to  doubt  w^as 
a  sin.  A  god  had  come  on  earth  to  save  a  world  which 
was  perishing  in  scepticism.  Simple  hearts  were  bound- 
ing with  gratitude  ;  and  no  devotion  could  be  too 
extreme,  and  no  expression  of  it  in  the  form  of  offer- 
ings too  extravagant,  ^sculapius  might  have  built  a 
throne  of  gold  for  himself  out  of  the  pious  contributions 
of  the  faithful.  Being  a  god  he  was  personally  dis- 
interested ;  "gold  and  silver,"  he  said  through  the 
oracle,  "  were  nothing  to  him  ;  he  commanded  only 
that  his  servant  the  prophet  should  receive  the  honors 
due  to  him." 

High  favor  such  as  had  fallen  upon  Alexander  could 
not  be  enjoyed  without  some  drawbacks.  The  world 
believed,  but  an  envious  minority  remained  incredulous, 
and  whispered  that  the  prophet  was  a  charlatan.  The 
men  of  science  persisted  that  miracles  were  against 
nature,  and  that  a  professing  worker  of  miiadi's  was 
necessarily  a  rogue.  The  Christians,  to  whom  Luciaii 
does  full  justice  in  the  matter,  regarded  Alexander  as  u 
missionary  of  the  devil,  and  abhorred  both  him  and  his 
works.  Coml^inations  were  formed  to  expose  him,  traps 
were  cleverly  laid  for  him,    into  which    all    his  adroit- 


!20  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FUOUDE. 

ness  could  not  save  him  from  occasionally  falling.  But 
lie  had  contrived  to  entangle  his  personal  credit  in  the 
great  spiritual  questions  which  were  agitating  mankind, 
and  to  enlist  in  his  interest  the  pious  side  of  paganism. 
The  schools  of  philosophy  were  divided  about  him.  The 
respectable  sects,  Platonists,  Stoics,  and  Pythagoreans, 
who  believed  in  a  spiritual  system  underlying  the  sensible, 
saw  in  the  manifestation  at  Abonotichus  a  revelation  in 
harmony  with  the  theories.  If  they  did  not  wholly 
believe,  they  looked  at  it  as  a  phenomenon  useful  to  an 
age  which  was  denying  the  supernatural. 

Alexander,  quick  to  catch  at  the  prevailing  influences, 
flattered  the  philosophers  in  turn.  Pythagoras  was 
made  a  saint  in  his  calendar.  He  spoke  of  Pythagoras 
as  the  greatest  of  the  ancient  sages.  He  claimed  to 
represent  him  ;  at  length  he  let  it  be  known  privately 
that  he  was  Pythagoras.  He  gilt  his  thigh,  and  the 
yellow  lustre  was  allowed  to  be  seen.  The  wise  man  of 
Samos  was  again  present  unrecognized,  hke  Apollo 
among  the  herdsmen  of  Admetus. 

The  philosophers  of  the  second  century,  if  Lucian  can 
be  believed,  were  not  a  lofty  set  of  beings.  They  pro- 
fessed sublime  doctrines,  but  the  doctrines  had  little 
effect  on  their  lives,  and  the  different  schools  hated  one 
another  with  genuine  sectarian  intensity.  The  Pythago- 
reans were  little  better  than  their  rivals,  but  their  teach- 
ing was  more  respectable.  They  insisted  that  men  had 
souls  as  well  as  bodies.  They  believed  in  immortality 
and  future  retribution,  and  they  had  the  sympathies 
with  them  of  the  decent  part  of  society.  Alexander's 
instinct  led  him  to  them  as  the  best  of  friends  he  could 
have  ;  antl  they  in  turn  were  ready  to  play  into  his 
hands  in  their  own  interests.  By  their  mystical  theories 
they   were   the  natural    victims   of    illusion.     Opinions 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SF.COND    CENTCRY.  121 

adopted  out  of  suiierstition  or  emotion  cannot  be  en- 
countered by  reason.  They  are  like  epidemic  diseases 
which  seize  and  subdue  the  mental  constitution.  They 
yield  only  "vvhen  they  have  spent  their  force,  and  are 
superseded  by  other  beliefs  of  an  analogous  kind.  Tht 
spiritual  world  is  ruled  by  homoeopathy,  and  one  disorder 
is  T*nly  cured  b}'^  a  second  and  a  similar  one. 

Thus  supported,  therefore,  Pythagoras  Alexander 
rejilied  to  attempts  at  exposure  by  open  defiance. 
Pontus,  he  said,  was  full  of  blaspheming  atheists  and 
Christians ;  ^sculapius  was  displeased  that,  after  he 
had  condescended  to  come  among  his  people,  such 
wretches  should  be  any  longer  tolerated  ;  and  he  de- 
ma/uded  that  they  should  be  stoned  out  of  the  province. 
A  pious  inquirer  was  set  to  ask  after  the  soul  of 
Epicurus,  ^sculapius  answered  that  Epicurus  was  in 
hell,  lying  in  filth  and  in  chains  of  lead.  The  Py- 
thagoreans clapped  their  hands.  Hell,  they  had  always 
said,  was  the  proper  place  for  him  ;  and  in  hell  he  was  ; 
the  oracle  had  declared  it. 

It  is  very  interesting  to  find  two  classes  of  men  gen- 
erally supposed  to  be  so  antagonistic  as  the  men  of 
science  and  the  Christians,  standing  alone  together 
against  the  world  as  the  opponents  of  a  lying  scoundrel. 
The  explanation  of  their  union  was  that  each  of  them 
had  hold  of  a  side  of  real  truth,  while  the  respectable 
world  was  given  over  to  shadows.  The  Epicureans 
understood  the  laws  of  nature  and  the  principles  of 
evidence.  The  Christians  lia<l  a  new  ideal  of  human  life 
and  duty  in  them,  which  was  to  regenerate  the  whole 
race  of  mankind.  It  was  tlnis  lit  and  i-ight  that  they 
should  work  too;ether  ajrainst  a  wretch  who  understood 
nothing  but  human  folly  and  tlu;  art  of  playing  upon  it, 
and   against    the    gulls    and   idiots    who    were    ready   to 


122  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE, 

swallow  any  absurdity  which  surprised  or  flattered 
them. 

The  Epicureans  were  Alexander's  most  dangerous 
enemies  ;  for  they  had  friends  in  the  higher  circles  of 
society.  Araestris,  between  Abonotichus  and  the  Bos- 
pliorus,  was  the  seat  of  the  provincial  administration. 
Lepidus,  the  Eoman  propraetor,  was  a  man  of  sense  and 
culture.  The  town  took  its  intellectual  tone  from  him, 
and  was  unfavorable  to  the  prophet's  pretensions. 
Ingenious  tricks  had  been  played  upon  him  from  that 
quarter  w^ith  too  much  success  ;  and  he  had  been  driven 
to  announce  that  for  the  future  no  inquiries  sent  from 
Amestris  would  be  entertained.  Some  mockeries  had 
followed.  Alexander  could  not  afford  to  let  the  public 
enthusiasm  cool,  and  mistakes  for  the  future  must  be 
avoided,  ^sculapius  had  hitherto  communicated  with 
his  worshippers  in  writing.  When  he  uttered  sounds,  it 
was  in  private  to  the  prophet.  To  silence  doubt,  the 
serpent  was  now  to  be  heard  directly  speaking.  A  tube 
was  fitted,  through  which  articulate  noises  could  be 
made  to  issue  from  the  snake's  mouth  with  the  help  of 
a  confederate  behind  the  curtain.  Select  visitors  only 
were  admitted  to  this  especially  sacred  performance,  and 
a  high  price  had  to  be  paid  for  it.  But  the  experiment 
was  tried  with  jjerfect  success  ;  and  the  method  was 
found  to  have  its  conveniences.  The  word-of-mouth 
oracles  were  taken  down  and  were  given  afterward  to 
the  world  ;  but  if  mistakes  had  been  made,  they  could 
be  altered  before  publication.  An  accident  of  the  kind 
happened  shortly  after,  which  might  have  been  dis- 
astrous if  the  original  practice  had  been  followed,  but 
which  Alexander  was  able  to  turn  into  a  brilliant  success. 

Severian,  a  Roman  general,  had  been  sent  by  the 
Emperor   Yerus    to    invade    Armenia.      He    called    at 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SECOND    CENTURY.  12:5 

Abonoticlius  on  his  way,  to  learn  if  lie  was  likely  to 
succeed,  and  ^Esculapius  encouraged  him  with  his  own 
lips  in  bad  Homeric  verse.  He  had  told  Severian  that 
he  would  subdue  the  Armenians,  and  return  in  glory  to 
Kome  with  the  bay  wreath  on  his  temples  and  wearing 
the  golden  circle  of  Apollo.  Severian,  whether  he 
believed  ^sculapius  or  not,  went  his  way,  lost  his  army, 
an<^  was  himself  killed.  The  oracle  was  immediatel}' 
reversed.  The  line  which  appeared  in  the  published 
record  was  :  *'  Go  not  against  the  Armenians,  where 
death  and  disaster  await  thee."  Thus  out  of  "the 
nettle  danger"  Alexander  "had  plucked  the  flower 
safety."  The  death  of  Severian  was  explained  by  his 
neglect  or  defiance  of  the  warning.  In  another  way, 
too,  he  showed  his  prudence.  He  made  friends  at  the 
rival  shrines."-  Monopolies,  he  knew,  were  odious  and 
dangerous.  If  J^sculapius  spoke  through  him,  Apollo 
spoke  now  and  then  elsewhere.  He  would  sometimes 
tell  a  patient  that  he  had  no  message  for  him,  and  that 
he  must  go  for  advice  to  Claros  or  to  the  cave  of  the 
Branchidae. 

Thus  he  continued  to  baffle  his  detractors,  and  to  rise 
from  glory  to  glory.  His  fame  reached  the  Imperial 
Court,  and  to  consult  Alexander  became  the  fashion  in 
high  Roman  society.  Ladies  of  rank,  men  of  business, 
intriguing  generals  or  senators,  took  into  their  counsels 
the  prophet  of  Abonoticlius.  Some  who  had  perilous 
political  schemes  on  hand  were  rash  enough  to  commit 
their  secrets  to  paper,  and  to  send  them,  under  the 
protection  of  their  seals,  for  the  opinion  of  ^Esculaiuus. 
The  prophet,  when  he  discovered  matter  of  this  kind, 
kept  the  packets  by  him  without  returning  them.  lie 
thus  held  the  writers  in  his  power,  and  made  them  feel 
that  their  lives  were  in  his  hands. 


I'^-i  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

And  tlici'o  wore  otliers  in  lii^'li  position,  men  of 
thought  wlio  were  waiting  for  some  kind  of  revelation, 
that  sought  him  out  from  purer  motives.  Rutilian,  a 
senator,  in  favor  with  the  Emperor,  a  man  of  al)ility, 
who  had  passed  his  h'fe  in  the  jjublic  service,  and  still 
held  an  important  office,  adopted  Alexander  for  his 
spiritual  father.  Rutilian  was  a  Pythagorean  of  most  de- 
vout temperament,  assiduous  in  prayers  to  the  Invisible 
Being  or  Beings  of  whose  existence  he  w^as  assured. 
\Yhen  he  heard  that  ^Esculapius  had  come  into  the 
world,  he  had  already  a  predisposition  to  believe,  and 
was  prevented  only  by  public  duties  from  flying  to  learn 
if  the  news  was  true.  lie  could  not  o-o  to  Pontus 
himself,  but  he  sent  friends  on  whom  lie  could  rely,  and 
whose  temperament  resembled  his  own.  The  majestic 
appearance  of  the  j^rojDlict,  the  inspired  eyes,  the  rich, 
sweet  voice,  awed  them  into  immediate  conviction. 
They  were  shown  wonders  ;  but  they  had  believed 
before  they  had  been  seen,  and  they  returned  to  Rome 
to  exaggerate  what  they  had  witnessed.  Rutilian, 
receiving  their  report  into  his  own  eager  imagination, 
brought  it  out  of  the  crucible  again  transfigured  yet 
more  gloriously.  lie  was  a  man  of  know^n  piety  and 
veracity,  incapable  of  conscious  falsehoods,  true  and  just 
in  all  his  dealings.  Astonished  Pome  could  not  yet 
wholly  surrender  itself.  Officers  of  the  imperial  house- 
hold hastened  over  to  see  with  their  own  eyes.  It  had 
not  occurred  to  them  that  they  might  see  things  wdiich 
they  could  not  explain,  yet  that  what  they  saw  might  be 
no  more  than  a  trick.  Men  witliout  scientific  training 
who  trust  their  own  judgment  in  such  matters  are  the 
natural  prey  of  charlatans.  These  gentlemen  came  to 
Abonotichus.  They  were  received  with  the  highest 
honors.     Alexander    displayed   his    miracles    to    them, 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SKCOND    CKXTURY.  I'^S 

made  them  handsome  presents,  and  sent  them  home 
open-mouthed  to  glorify  ^Escuhipius  and  his  prophet  in 
the  fullest  confidence  that  they  were  speaking  nothing 
but  the  truth.  Rutilian  was  triumphant.  He  was  now 
either  relieved  from  office,  or  he  obtained  leave  of 
absence,  and  at  last  was  al)le  to  throw  himself  in  person 
at  the  apostle's  feet.  He  was  sixty  years  old  at  the  time 
wll^n  the  acquaintance  began.  His  wife  was  dead,  and 
he  had  one  only  son.  The  first  question  which  he  asked 
Alexander  was  about  his  boy's  education.  Alexander 
told  him  that  his  teachers  were  to  be  Pythagoras  and 
Homer.  The  child  died,  and  went  to  his  tutors  in 
Hades  ;  and  the  prophet  at  the  first  step  had  given  a 
convincing  proof  of  his  inspiration.  Lucian,  in  his  con- 
ten>pt  of  folly,  half  pardons  Alexander  when  such  a 
man  as  Rutilian  was  so  eager  to  be  his  dupe.  The  new 
disciple,  being'a  Pythagorean,  believed  in  pre- existence. 
He  asked  through  what  personalities  he  had  himself 
passed  already.  Alexander  told  him  that  he  had  been 
no  less  a  person  than  Achilles.  After  Achilles  he  had 
been  Menander,  and  when  his  present  life  was  over  he 
was  to  become  immortal,  and  live  thenceforward  as  a 
sunbeam.  Rutilian  believed  it  all.  Xo  absurdity  was 
too  monstrous  for  him  ;  while  he  on  his  part  was  infinitely 
useful  to  Alexander.  Few  sceptics  were  hardy  enough 
thenceforward  to  question  the  character  of  the  friend  of 
the  Emperor's  favorite. 

Anion"-  his  female  adorers  or  connections,  of  whom 
Alexander  had  as  many  as  Brigham  Young,  there  was  a 
girl  whom  he  called  his  daughter,  on  the  mother's  side  of 
exalted  parentage.  Selene,  or  the  Moon,  had  seen  Alex- 
ander sleeping  like  Endymion,  had  be(!<>me  enamored  of 
liiiii,  and  had  descended  to  his  embraces.  Tlie  young 
ladr  he  declared  to  be  the  offspring  of  this  celestial  union. 


I"2^  SKETCIIKS    FliOM    .T.    A.    FK'OLDE. 

KiitiHan,  l)eing  a  widower,  was  infonued  that  Selene 
and  ^Esculapius  liad  selected  him  to  be  her  husband. 
He  was  delighted.  He  believed  the  marriage  to  be  an 
adoption  into  heaven.  Like  Menelaus,  he  would  never 
die,  being  the  son-in-law  of  a  god,  and  the  nuptials  were 
celebrated  with  august  solemnity. 

Abonotichus  after  this  became  a  holy  city,  a  Mecca, 
a  place  of  pilgrimage.  The  prophet  was  a  power  in  the 
Empire,  and  began  to  surround  himself  with  pomp  and 
display.  Among  other  ceremonies  he  instituted  a  public 
service  in  the  temple  in  imitation  of  the  mysteries  of 
Eleusis.  That  he  was  able  to  present  such  scenes  with 
impunity  is  a  most  curious  illustration  of  the  mental 
condition  of  the  time. 

The  service  commenced  with  a  procession  of  acolytes, 
carrjang  torches,  the  prophet  at  their  head,  like  the 
priests  of  Ceres,  giving  notice  to  the  profane  to  keep 
aloof,  and  inviting  the  believers  in  ^Esculapius  to  ap- 
proach and  take  part  in  the  holy  mystery.  The  profane 
whom  he  specially  meant  were  the  Christians  and  the 
atheists.  The  prophet  spoke  ;  the  congregation  an- 
swered. The  prophet  said,  ''  Away  with  the  Chris- 
tians !"  The  people  replied,  "  Away  wath  the  atheists  !" 
Those  who  presented  themselves  for  comumnion  were 
examined  first  l)y  Alexander  to  ascertain  their  fitness. 
If  found  unorthodox,  they  were  excluded  from  the 
temple.  The  ceremonial  then  commenced.  It  con- 
sisted of  a  series  of  tableaux.  The  first  day  was  given 
to  representations  of  the  lying-in  of  Latona,  the  birth  of 
Apollo,  the  marriage  of  Apollo  and  Coronis,  with  the 
issue  of  it  in  the  generation  of  ^^sculapius.  On  the 
second  day  there  was  the  incarnation  of  "  the  sweet 
one,''  with  the  Chalcedon  plates,  the  goose  egg,  and  the 
snake.      Alexander  himself  was  the   hero  of  the  third. 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SEOOXD    CENTURY.  12? 

A  new  revelation,  it  seems,  liad  informed  him  of  mys- 
terious circumstances  attending  his  own  coming  into  the 
world.  His  mother  had  been  visited  bj  Podalirius, 
^.sculapius's  mythical  son.  The  temple  was  then  brill- 
iantly illuminated.  The  prophet,  after  some  prelimi- 
nary gesticulations,  laid  himself  down,  as  Endymion,  to 
sleep  upon  a  couch.  Selene,  the  Moon,  personated  by 
thii'beautiful  wife  of  an  officer  of  the  imperial  court,  who 
was  the  prophet's  mistress,  descended  upon  him  from 
the  roof  and  covered  him  with  kisees,  the  husband 
looking  on,  delighted  with  the  honor  which  had  fallen 
upon  him.  In  the  final  scene,  Alexander  reappeared  in 
liis  priestly  dress.  A  hymn  was  sung  to  the  snake,  the 
congr'.gation  accompanying  or  responding.  The  choir 
then  formed  into  a  circle  and  went  through  a  mystic 
dance,  the  prophet  standing  in  the  centre. 

The  miraculous  birth  of  Alexander,  after  being  thus 
announced,  was  made  into  an  article  of  faith,  which  the 
disciples  were  bound  to  receive.  A  difficulty  arose 
which  hfid  not  been  foreseen.  If  he  was  the  son  of  a 
irod,  how  could  he  be  Pvtluiijoras  ?  and  how  came  he  bv 
tlie  golden  tliigli  ?  He  was  equal  to  the  occasion  ;  he 
was  not  Pytliagoras,  lie  said,  and  yet  ho  was.  He  had 
the  same  soul  with  Pvthaijoras  ;  for  that  soul  was  the 
Spirit  of  God,  which  waned  and  was  renewed  like  the 
moon.  The  Spirit  descended  fi-om  heaven  at  special 
times  and  on  spcctial  persons,  and  again  ascended  when 
its  purpose  wa.s  attained.  The  gold  thigh  was  perliaps 
('X])lained  as  its  a('comj>anying  symbol. 

IIavin<r  identiiicil  himself  with  the  Pvtha<jjoreans,  he 
announced  with  anthority  the  general  truth  of  their 
<loctrines.  He  insisted  on  an  elevated  morality,  ami 
<lirected  his  disciples  to  abstain  from  sensual  vices.  The 
rules,    however,    hail    no     ap])licati()n    to     himself,    and 


128  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FROUDE. 

behind  the  veil  he  created  a  Cyprian  paradise.  His 
reputation  being  so  well  established,  the  privilege  of 
admission  to  the  temple  rites  was  eagerly  sought  after. 

The  oracle,  meanwhile,  was  active  as  ever,  and  now 
and  then  by  its  niistakes  produced  frightful  injustice. 
A  Paphlagonian  gentleman  had  sent  his  son  to  be  edu- 
cated at  Alexandria.  The  boy  had  joined  an  expedition 
up  the  Nile,  where  he  fell  in  with  some  merchants  on 
their  way  to  the  Ked  Sea  and  India.  Curiosity  led 
him  to  accompany  them  ;  and  his  household  in  the  city, 
who  had  charge  of  him,  after  waiting  for  a  while  and 
finding  that  he  did  not  come  back,  concluded  that  he 
had  been  drowned  in  the  river,  and  returned  to  Paphla- 
gonia  with  the  news  that  the  boy  was  dead.  The  father 
consulted  the  seer  of  Abonotichus.  Alexander  informed 
him  that  his  son  had  been  made  away  with  by  the 
servants.  The  Roman  governor  was  appealed  to.  The 
word  of  Alexander,  supported  as  he  was  by  Rutilian,  was 
conclusive,  and  the  unfortunate  wretches  were  thrown  to 
the  wild  beasts.  Soon  after,  the  boy  appeared,  none 
the  worse  for  his  journey  ;  and  an  indignant  friend  of 
the  family  went  to  Abonotichus  to  expose  the  impostor 
before  his  M'orshippers.  Unfortunately,  a  superstition 
once  established  is  proof  against  commonplace  evidence. 
Alexander  only  answered  by  telling  the  congregation  to 
stone  the  blasphemer,  who  was  rescued  when  nearly 
dead  by  the  interposition  of  a  casual  traveller. 

Another  adventure  into  which  he  fell  might  have 
been  more  dangerous.  The  war  of  Marcus  Aurelius  with 
the  Marcomanni  was  the  occasion  of  the  celebrated  story 
in  Christian  mythology  of  the  Thundering  Legion.  It 
is  difficult,  and  even  impossible,  to  reconcile  the  account 
of  the  war  in  the  Christian  legend  with  Lucian's  descrip- 
tion of  it  ;  but  Luciau  was  alive  at  the  time,  and  when 


A    CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE    SECOND    CENTURY.  I'-IO 

he  says  that  the  Emperor  was  disastrously  defeated,  he 
is  unlikely  to  have  been  mistaken.  Lucian  says  that 
Marcus  Aurelius,  before  he  began  the  campaign,  applied 
to  Alexander.  Alexander  told  him  that  if  he  devoted 
two  lions  to  the  gods  and  threw  them  into  the  Danube, 
there  would  be  a  glorious  victory  and  a  happy  peace. 
T]\^  lions  swam  the  riv^er,  landed  on  the  opposite  bank, 
and  were  immediately  killed.  The  Emperor  lost  a 
battle  and  many  thousand  men.  Aquileia  itself  nearly 
escaped  being  taken. 

This  catastrophe  tried  the  faith  even  of  Rutilian. 
Alexander,  however,  told  him  that  the  gods  had  fore- 
told a  victory,  but  had  not  allowed  hiin  to  know  on 
which  side  the  victory  would  be.  Rutilian  resisted 
temptation  and  continued  to  believe. 

Affairs,  however,  had  become  serious,  when  such  a 
man  was  allowed  to  play  with  the  interests  of  the 
Empire.  Intelligent  Romans  went  to  Abonotichus  to 
make  inquiries,  and  were  so  troublesome  that  ^sculapius 
had  to  interfere.  When  a  stranger  arrived,  the  god 
decided  whether  he  was  to  be  admitted  to  reside  in  the 
town.  A  suspicious  visitor  was  ordered  to  depart  under 
penalties.  At  last,  as  a  public  warning  against  the 
dangerous  spirit  of  scepticism,  Alexander  burned  a  copy 
of  the  writings  of  Epicurus  in  the  market  square,  and 
threw  the  ashes  into  the  sea.  Lepidus  of  Amestris,  tlie 
Roman  governor,  made  another  effort.  The  prophet 
was  on  his  guard  against  laymen  ;  but  a  priest,  it  was 
thought,  miglit  lie  more  fortunate.  A  priest  was  sent, 
but  unluckily  the  priest  was  a  fool  and  gave  Alexander 
a  new  triumpli.  lie  was  granted  an  interview  with 
"the  sweet  one,"  and  conversation  followed  which 
Lucian  saw  hung  up  in  a  temple  at  Tium,  written  in 
letters  of  gold  : 


loO  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   rilOUUE. 

Priest.  Tell  me,  Lord  Glycon,  who  art  thou  ? 

Glycon.  I  am  the  young  ^sculapius,  the  second  and  not  the 
first.     This  is  a  mystery,  which  may  not  be  revealed. 

Priest.  How  long  wilt  thou  remain  with  us  ? 

Glycon.  My  time  is  a  thousand  years  and  three.  Then  I  go  to 
tho  East  to  the  barbarians.     They  also  must  hear  my  word. 

Priest.   What  will  become  of  me  after  this  life  ? 

Olycon.  First  thou  wilt  be  a  camel,  and  then  a  prophet  like 
Alexander. 

The  dialogue  ended  with  a  curse    on  Lepidus  for  his 
inquisiti\^eness  and  unbelief. 

Other  means  failing,  the  adventure  was  next  under- 
taken by  Lucian  himself.  Lucian  was  a  friend  of 
Rutilian.  He  had  many  times  remonstrated  with 
him.  He  had  endeavored  to  prevent  his  marriage. 
He  had  protested  against  the  countenance  which  Ru- 
tilian  was  lending  to  a  lying  rogue.  Rutilian  pitied 
Lucian' s  hardness  of  heart,  and  perhaps  advised  him 
to  go  to  Abonotichus  and  examine  for  himself.  Lucian, 
at  any  rate,  went.  Rutilian's  friendship  secured  him 
respectful  treatment,  Alexander  received  him  with 
extreme  courtesy,  and  he  admits  that  the  prophet's 
manners  and  appearance  surprised  and  struck  him.  But 
Lucian  was  fortified  with  a  conviction  that  all  pretenders 
to  supernatural  powers  were  enthusiasts  or  imjDOstors, 
that  miracles  had  never  been  and  could  not  be.  He 
tried  ^Esculapius  with  unusual  questions.  He  asked  him 
first  if  the  prophet  wore  false  hair.  He  sealed  his  envel- 
ope so  skilfully  that  it  could  not  be  opened,  and  he  re- 
ceived an  answer  in  an  "  unknown  tongue."  He  dis- 
covei-ed  next  that  the  prophet  had  been  sounding  his 
valet  as  to  Lucian's  object  in  coming  to  him.  The  valet 
was  faithful,  and  Lucian  bnde  him  tell  Alexander  that 
he  Avas    suffering  from   a   pain    in  his   side.     He   then 


A   CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SECOND    CENTURY.  I'M 

MTote,  himself,  on  two  slips  of  paper,  "  What  was  the 
birthplace  of  Homer  ?  inclosed  them  in  two  packets, 
and  sealed  them  as  before.  The  valet  informed  the 
prophet  that  one  referred  to  the  pain,  and  that  the  other 
was  to  ask  whether  his  master  should  return  to  Italy  bv 
land  or  sea.  The  replies  were,  first,  an  advice  to  try 
AJexander's  plaster  ;  secondly,  an  intimation  that  a 
voyage  wonld  prove  dangerous.  These  experiments 
would  have  been  enough  for  Lucian,  but  his  object  was 
rather  to  convince  his  friend  than  himself,  and  he  tried 
again. 

This  time  he  wrote,  "  When  will  the  villainies  of 
Alexander  be  exposed  ?"  At  the  back  of  the  envelope 
he  made  a  note  that  it  contained  eight  questions,  all  of 
wllich  he  paid  for.  The  prophet  was  completely 
caught  ;  he  returned  eight  answers,  the  whole  of  them 
unintelligible  ;  and  with  demonstration,  as  he  thought, 
in  his  hands,  Lucian  went  to  his  friend. 

He  found  his  labor  thrown  away.  Belief  in  the 
marvellous  does  not  rise  from  evidence  and  will  not 
yield  to  it.  There  is  the  easy  answer,  that  infidels  are 
answered  according  to  the  impiety  of  their  hearts,  that 
the  gods  will  not  and  perhaps  cannot  work  miracles  in 
the  presence  of  sceptics.  Nothing  came  of  this  first 
visit  except  that  Lucian  lost  tlic  regard  of  his  friend 
whom  Alexander  warned  against  him.  But  he  had 
become  interested  in  the  matter  ;  li(3  determined  to 
probe  the  mystery  to  the  bottom.  He  went  to  the 
governor  and  offered,  if  Ik;  could  have  security  for  his 
life,  to  furnisb  liim  witli  proofs  of  the  imposition  wliicli 
would  justify  the  interference  of  the  police. 

The  governor  gave  him  a  guard  of  soldiers,  an<l  tlins 
attended  lie  went  to  Abonoticlnis  a  second  time.  Tlu^ 
prophet  was  lif)lding  his  lovcp.      l.iiciMii    presented  him- 


132  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

self,  neglecting  to  make  an  obeisance,  to  the  general 
scandal.  The  prophet  took  no  notice,  but  gave  him  his 
hand  to  kiss,  and  Lucian  bit  it  to  the  bone.  Tlie  be- 
lievers shrieked,  and  Lncian  would  have  been  strangled 
but  for  his  guard.  Alexander,  however,  to  liis  surprise 
and  real  admiration,  bore  the  pain  manfully.  He  told 
his  friends  that  he  and  his  god  had  tamed  ruder  spirits 
than  Lucian's  ;  he  bade  them  all  retire,  and  leave  him 
and  his  visitor  together. 

When  they  were  alone,  he  asked  Lucian  quietly  why 
a  person  whose  acquaintance  he  had  valued,  was  de- 
termined to  be  his  enemy.  Calmness  is  always  agree- 
able. Lurian  never  doubted  for  a  moment  Alexander's 
real  character,  but  the  prophet  interested  him  in  spite  of 
himself.  That  he  might  study  him  at  leisure,  he  ac- 
cepted his  overtures,  and  even  entered  into  some  kind 
of  intimacy  with  him.  He  stayed  for  some  days  at 
Abonotichus.  The  worshippers  were  astonished  to  find 
an  open  blasphemer  admitted  to  confidential  intercourse 
with  their  chief  ;  and  Alexander  undoubtedly  succeeded, 
if  not  in  disarming  his  guest's  suspicions,  yet  in  soften- 
ing the  vehemence  of  his  dislike.  He  was  so  clever,  so 
well  informed,  apparently  so  frank  and  open,  that,  as 
Lucian  said,  he  would  have  taken  in  Epicurus  himself. 
The  search  for  evidence  against  him  was  dropped,  the 
governor's  guard  was  sent  home,  and  Lucian  after  a 
prolonged  visit  accepted  an  offer  from  Alexander  to 
send  him  by  water  to  the  Bosphorus.  The  prophet 
placed  at  his  disposition  one  of  his  finest  vessels,  saw 
him  on  board,  loaded  him  with  presents,  and  so  dis- 
missed him. 

Keener- witted  man  than  Lucian  was  not  alive  on  earth  ; 
yet  his  wit  had  not  saved  him  from  being  to  some  extent 
deceived,  and  he  had  a  near  escape  of  paying    with  his 


A   CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SECOND    CENTURY.  133 

life  for  his  credulity.  He  hud  not  been  long  at  sea 
when  he  observed  the  pilot  and  crew  consulting  to- 
gether. The  crew  were  insisting  n'pon  something  to 
which  the  pilot  would  not  consent.  The  pilot  at  length 
came  to  him  and  said  that  "  Alexander's  orders  were 
that  Lncian  was  to  be  thrown  overboard  ;  he  had  a  wife 
and  children,  he  had  lived  respectably  for  sixty  years, 
arid  did  not  wish  in  his  old  age  to  stain  his  conscience 
witli  a  murder.  He  could  not  go  on  to  the  Bosphorus, 
but  he  would  put  his  passenger  on  sliore. ' ' 

Lucian  was  landed  in  Bithynia.  He  was  a  person  of 
considerable  public  influence.  He  had  powerful  friends 
in  the  province  and  at  Rome.  He  was  looked  on  favor- 
a,bly  by  Marcus  Aurelius  himself.  He  laid  his  story 
before  the  governor,  not  Lepidus,  but  another  ;  and 
Lucian,  if  any  one,  might  be  assured  that  what  he  said 
would  receive  attention.  But  in  an  era  of  belief,  reason 
and  fact  are  powerless  ;  the  governor  told  him  that  if 
he  could  convict  Alexander  on  the  clearest  evidence  it 
would  be  impossible  to  punish  him.  Prophet  he  was  in 
the  opinion  of  the  whole  country,  and  prophet  he  M^ould 
remain.  Lucian  was  as  little  successful  as  his  predeces- 
sors, and  his  interference  had  gained  him  nothing  except 
materials  for  the  singular  account  which  he  has  left 
behind.  Hutilian  was  abandoned  to  fate  and  to  the 
daughter  of  the  Moon,  and  the  glories  of  the  prophet  of 
Abonotichus  were  established  above  the  reach  of  cal- 
umny. The  emperor  bestowed  distinctions  on  him. 
The  name  of  his  town  was  changed.  Coins  were  struck, 
and  now  are  extant,  with  "  the  sweet  one's"  face  on  one 
side  and  Alexander's  on  the  other.  He  lived  to  be  an 
old  man,  and  died  with  his  fame  undimmed  and  tlio 
belief  in  him  unabated.  What  became  of  the  snake, 
history  omits  to  tell. 


l'-)-^  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

The  superstition  did  nut  break  in  pieces  at  onee.  The 
oracle  continued  to  propliecy  after  Alexander  s  death, 
and  there  was  a  competition  among  the  disciples  as  to 
which  of  them  was  to  succeed  liim.  The  favorite  can- 
didate was  an  old  physician,  who,  Lucian  says,  ought 
not  to  have  been  found  in  such  company.  The  dispute 
was  referred  at  last  to  Rutilian,  M'ho  decided  that  no 
successor  was  needed.  Alexander  was  not  dead,  but  was 
translated  merely  into  a  better  world,  from  which  he 
still  watched  over  his  faithful  followers. 

So  ends  this  singular  story,  valuable  for  the  light 
which  it  throws  on  a  critical  epoch  in  human  history, 
and  especially  on  the  disposition  of  the  people  among 
whom  Paul  and  Barnabas  were  taken  for  gods,  and 
among  whom  Paul  founded  his  seven  churches.  Chris- 
tianity exactly  met  what  they  were  searching  for  in  an 
ennobling  and  purifying  form,  and  saved  those  who 
accepted  it  from  being  the  victims  of  sham  prophets  like 
Alexander.  To  persons  so  circumstanced,  men  of  in- 
tellect like  Lucian  addressed  themselves  in  vain.  The 
science  of  Epicurus  was  merely  negative.  He  nn'ght 
insist  that  miracles  were  an  illusion,  and  that  the  laws  of 
nature  were  never  broken  ;  but  to  the  human  heart 
craving  for  light  from  heaven,  and  refusing  to  be 
satisfied  without  it,  Epicurus  had  not  a  word  to  say, 
not  a  M'-ord  of  what  lay  behind  the  veil,  not  a  w^ord 
which  would  serve  for  a  guidance  in  the  paths  of 
ordinary  duty.  Intellect  and  experience  may  make  it 
probable  to  thoughtful  persons  that  morality  and  happi- 
aess  go  together  ;  but  when  all  is  said,  clever  men  arc 
found  of  a  different  opinion  ;  and  if  the  human  race  had 
waited  to  recognize  the  sanctions  of  moral  obligation  till 
science  had  made  out  on  what  they  rested  to  its  own 
satisfaction,  the  first  steps  out  of  barbarism  would  never 


A   CAGLIOSTRO    OF   THE   SECOND    CENTURY.  135 

have  been  taken.  Knowledge  is  a  plant  which  grows 
but  slowly.  Those  who  gather  knowledge  must  live 
before  they  can  learn.  How  to  live,  therefore,  how  to 
distinguish  good  from  evil,  press  first  for  an  immediate 
answer.  And  tlie  answer  was  given  by  conscience  whole 
feons  before  reflecting  intellect  had  constructed  its  the. 
ories  of  expediency  and  the  greatest  happiness  of  tlie 
gi'eatest  number. 
-X)ut  of  conscience  g-rows  relio-ion  ;  but  rcljo-ion  when 
St."  Paul  came  was  dead,  and  the  educated  multitudes  in 
'the  Empire  were  sitting  by  the  body  of  it,  unable  to 
believe  that  it  was  gone,  and  still  passionately  hoping 
that  the  silent  gods  would  again  speak  to  tliem  ont 
of  heaven.  So  intense  was  the  longing,  tliat  reason 
had  abdicated  its  proper  function  ;  any  plausible  pre- 
tender could  collect  disciples  in  millions  ;  and  to  an 
audience  thus  prepared  to  receive  it,  Christianity  was 
originally  offered.  Independent  of  philosophy,  the 
better  sort  of  men  hate  evil  and  impurity  ;  their  in- 
stincts were  recognized  and  justified  in  the  new  creed, 
and  the}"^  welcomed  it  as  a  reviving  principle  of  moral 
life.  It  did  not  save  them  from  illusions  which  men  of 
science  would  have  escaped.  Holiness  of  life  is  no 
protection  against  freaks  of  imagination  ;  God  is  so  near 
to  the  believer  that  he  sees  His  action  everywhere,  and 
the  hagiology  of  the  early  Church  is  as  full  of  legend  as 
the  pagan  mythology.  The  apocryphal  gospels  breathe 
a  spirit  to  the  full  as  credulous  as  the  story  of  the  in- 
carnation of  Glycon  at  Abonotichus  ;  with  this  essential 
and  enormous  difference,  however,  that  the  credulity  of 
the  Christians  was  dominated  hy  conscience,  and  they 
detected  a  jyolhited  hn))OHtor  roith  as  sure  an  instinct  as 
the  most  eidtivated  Epicurean.''' 

*  Tlie  italic:!  are  not  Mr.  Froude's. — Editor. 


IV. 

SOCIAL   CONDITION    OF  ENGLAND   IN   THE 
SIXTEENTH   CENTURY.* 

In  periods  like  the  present,  when  knowledge  is  everj 
day  extending,  and  the  habits  and  thoughts  of  mankind 
are  perpetually  changing  under  the  influence  of  new  dis- 
coveries, it  is  no  easy  matter  to  throw  ourselves  back 
into  a  time  in  which  for  centuries  the  European  world 
grew  upon  a  single  type,  in  which  the  forms  of  the 
father's  thoughts  were  the  forms  of  the  son's,  and  the 
late  descendant  was  occupied  in  treading  into  paths  the 
footprints  of  his  distant  ancestors.  So  absolutely  has 
change  become  the  law  of  our  present  condition,  that  it 
is  identified  with  energy  and  moral  health  ;  to  cease  to 
change  is  to  lose  place  in  the  great  race  ;  and  to  pass 
away  from  off  the  earth  with  the  same  convictions  which 
we  found  when  we  entered  it,  is  to  have  missed  the  best 
object  for  which  we  now  seem  to  exist. 

It  has  been,  however,  with  the  race  of  men  as  it  has 
been  with  the  planet  which  they  inhabit.  As  we  look 
back  over  history,  we  see  times  of  change  and  progress 
alternating  with  other  times  when  hfe  and  thought  have 
settled  into  permanent  forms  ;  when  mankind,  as  if  by 
common  consent,  have  ceased  to  seek  for  increase  of 
knowledge,  and,  contented  with  what  they  possess,  have 
endeavored  to  make  use  of  it  for  purposes   of  moral 

*  From  "  History  of  England." 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  137 

<eultivation.  Such  was  the  condition  of  the  Greeks 
through  many  ages  before  the  Persian  war  ;  such  was 
that  of  the  Eonians  till  the  world  revenged  itself  upon 
its  conquerors  by  the  introduction  among  them  of  the 
habits  of  the  conquered  ;  and  such  again  became  the 
'condition  of  Europe  when  the  Northerii  aations  grafted 
ike  religion  and  the  laws  of  the  "Western  empire  on  their 
'  own  hardy  natures,  and  shaped  out  that  wonderful 
spiritual  and  political  organization  which  remained  mi- 
ekaken  for  a  thousand  years. 

The  aspirant  after  sanctity  in  the  fifteenth  century  of 
the  Christian  era  found  a  model  which  he  could  imitate 
in  detail  in  the  saint  of  the  fifth.  The  gentleman  at  the 
"court  of  Edward  IV.  or  Charles  of  Burgundy  could 
imagine  no  nobler  type  of  heroism  than  he  found  in  the 
stories  of  King  Arthur's  knights.  The  forms  of  life  had 
become  more  elaborate,  the  surface  of  it  more  polished  ; 
but  the  life  itself  remained  essentially  the  same  ;  it  was 
the  development  of  the  same  conception  of  human  ex- 
cellence ;  just  as  the  last  orders  of  Gothic  architecture 
were  the  development  of  the  first,  from  which  the  idea 
had  worked  its  way  till  the  force  of  it  was  exhausted. 

A  condition  of  things  differing  alike  both  outwardly 
and  inwardly  from  that  into  which  a  happier  fortune  has 
introduced  ourselves,  is  necessarily  obscure  to  us.  In 
the  alteration  of  our  own  character,  we  have  lost  the  key 
which  would  interpret  the  characters  of  our  fathers,  and 
the  great  men  even  of  our  own  English  history  before 
the  Reformation  seem  to  us  almost  like  the  fossil  skele- 
tons of  another  order  of  beings.  Some  broad  conclu- 
sions as  to  what  they  were  are  at  least  possible  to  us, 
liowever  ;  and  we  are  able  to  determine,  with  toler- 
able certainty,  the  social  condition  of  the  people  of  this 
country,  such  as  it  was  before  the  movements  of  the 


138  SKETCIIKS    FIIOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

sixteenth    century,   and    during    the    process  of   those 
movements. 

The  extent  of  the  population  can  only  be  rudely  con- 
jectured. A  rough  census  was  taken  at  the  time  of  the 
Armada,  when  it  was  found  to  be  something  under  five 
millions  ;  bat  anterior  to  this  I  can  find  no  authority  on 
Avhich  I  can  rely  with  any  sort  of  confidence.  It  is  my 
impression,  however,  from  a  number  of  reasons — each  in 
itself  insignificant,  but  which  taken  together  leave  little 
doubt  upon  my  mind  —that  it  had  attained  that  number 
by  a  growth  so  slow  as  to  be  scarcely  perceptible,  and 
had  nearly  approached  to  it  many  generations  before. 
Simon  Fish,  in  "  The  Supphcation  of  Beggars,"  says 
that  the  number  of  households  in  England  in  1531  was 
520,000.  His  calculation  is  of  the  most  random  kind  ; 
for  he  rates  the  number  of  parishes  at  52,000,  with  ten 
households  on  an  average  in  each  parish.  A  mistake  so 
preposterous  respecting  the  number  of  parishes  shows 
the  great  ignorance  of  educated  men  upon  the  subject. 
The  ten  households  in  each  parish  may,  probably  (in 
some  parts  of  the  counti-y),  have  been  a  correct  computa- 
tion ;  but  this  tells  us  little  with  respect  to  the  aggre- 
gate numbers,  for  the  households  were  very  large— the 
farmers  and  the  gentlemen  also,  usually  having  all  the 
persons  whom  they  employed  residing  under  their  own 
roof.  X  jit  her  from  this,  therefore,  nor  from  any  other 
positive  statement  which  I  have  seen,  can  I  gather  any 
conclusion  that  may  be  depended  upon.  But  when  we 
remember  the  exceeding  slowness  with  which  the  popula- 
tion multiplied  in  a  time  in  which  we  can  accurately 
measure  it— that  is  to  say,  from  1588  to  the  opening  of 
the  last  century— under  circumstances  in  every  way  more 
favorable  to  an  increase,  I  think  we  may  assume  that  the 
increase  was  not  so  great  between  1500  and  1588,  and 


SIXTEENTH   CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  139 

that,  previous  to  1500,  it  did  not  more  tlian  keep  pace 
with  the  waste  from  civil  and  foreign  war.  The  causes, 
indeed,  were  wholly  wanting  which  lead  to  a  rapid 
growth  of  numbers.  Numbers  now  increase  with  the 
increase  of  employment  and  with  the  facilities  which  are 
provided  by  the  modern  S3'stem  of  labor  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  independent  households.  At  present,  any 
able-bodied  unskilled  laborer  earns,  as  soon  as  he  has 
arrived  at  man's  estate,  as  large  an  amount  of  wages  as 

^lie  will  earn  at  any  subsequent  time  ;  and  having  no 
connection  with  his  employer  beyond  the  receiving  the 
due  amount  of  weekly  money  from  him,  and  thinking 
himself  as  well  able  to  marry  as  he  is  likely  to  be,  he 

'  ^kes  a  wife,  and  is  usually  the  father  of  a  family  before 
he  is  thirty.  Before  the  Reformation,  not  only  were 
early  marrtages  determinately  discouraged,  but  the 
opportunity  for  them  did  not  exist,  A  laborer  living 
in  a  cottage  by  himself  w^as  a  rare  exception  to  the 
rule  ;  and  the  work  of  the  field  was  performed  gener- 
ally, as  it  now  is  in  the  large  farms  in  America  and 
Australia,  by  servants  who  lived  in  the  families  of  the 
squire  or  the  farmer,  and  who,  while  in  that  position, 
commonly  remained  single,  and  married  only  when  by 
prudence  they  saved  a  sufficient  sum  to  enable  them  to 
enter  some  other  position. 

Checked  by  circumstances  of  this  kind,  population 
would  necessarily  remain  almost  stationary,  and  a  ten- 
dency to  an  increase  was  not  of  itself  regarded  by  the 
statesmen  of  the  day  as  any  matter  for  congratulation  or 
as  any  evidence  of  national  prosperity.  Not  an  increase 
of  population,  which  would  facilitate  production  and  beat 
down  wages  by  competition,  but  the  increase  of  the 
commonwealth,  the  sound  and  healthy  maintenance  ol 
the  population  already  existing,  were  the  chief  objects 


140  SKETCHES    FROM   J.   A.   FROUDE, 

M'liich  the  government  proposed  to  itself  ;  and  altliough 
Ilenry  VIII.  carefully  nursed  his  manufactures,  there  is 
sufficient  proof  in  the  grounds  alleged  for  the  measures 
to  which  he  resorted,  that  there  was  little  redundancy 
of  occupation. 

In  a  statute,  for  instance,  for  the  encouragement  of 
the  linen  manufactures,  it  is  said,  that — ''  The  King's 
Highness,  calling  to  Lis  most  blessed  remembrance  the 
great  number  of  idle  people  daily  increasing  throughout 
this  his  Realm,  supposeth  that  one  great  cause  thereof  is 
by  the  continued  bringing  into  the  same  the  great 
number  of  wares  and  merchandize  made,  and  brought 
out  from,  the  parts  beyond  the  sea  into  this  his  Realm, 
ready  wrought  by  manual  occupation  ;  amongst  the  which 
wares  one  kind  of  merchandize  in  great  quantity,  which 
is  linen  cloth  of  divers  sorts  made  in  divers  countries 
beyond  the  sea,  is  daily  conveyed  into  this  Realm  ;  which 
great  quantity  of  linen  cloth  so  brought  is  consumed 
and  spent  within  the  same  ;  by  reason  whereof  not  only 
the  said  strange  countries  where  the  said  linen  cloth  is 
made,  by  the  policy  and  industry  of  making  and  vending 
the  same  are  greatly  enriched  ;  and  a  marvellous  great 
number  of  their  people,  men,  women,  and  children,  are 
set  on  work  and  occupation,  and  kept  from  idleness,  to 
the  great  furtherance  and  advancement  of  their  common- 
wealth ;  but  also  contrary  wise  the  inhabitants  and  sub- 
jects of  this  Realm,  for  lack  of  like  policy  and  industry, 
are  compelled  to  buy  all  or  most  part  of  the  linen  cloth 
consumed  in  the  same,  amounting  to  inestimable  sums 
of  money.  And  also  the  people  of  this  Realm,  as  well 
men  as  women,  which  should  and  might  be  set  on  work, 
by  exercise  of  like  policy  and  craft  of  spinning,  weaving, 
and  making  of  cloth,  lies  now  in  idleness  and  otiosity,  to 
the  high  displeasure  of  Almighty  God,  great  diminution 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  141 

of  the  King's  people,  and  extreme  ruin,  decay,  and 
impoverishment  of  this  Reahn.  Therefore,  for  reforma- 
tion of  these  things,  the  King's  most  Roval  Majesty 
intending,  like  a  most  virtuons  Prince,  to  provide 
remedy  in  the  premises  ;  nothing  so  much  coveting  as 
''the  increase  of  the  Commonwealth  of  this  his  Realm, 
.tdth  also  the  virtuous  exercise  of  his  most  loving  sub- 
jects and  people,  and  to  avoid  that  most  abominable  sin 
of  -idleness  out  of  the  Realm,  hath,  by  the  advice  and 
consent  of  his  Lords  and  Commons  in  Parliament  assem- 
bled,  ordained  and  enacted  that  every  person  occupying 
land  for  tillage,  shall  for  every  sixty  acres  which  he  hath 
under  the  plough,  sow  one  quarter  of  an  acre  in  flax  or 
'hpnp. " 
■  This  Act  was  designed  immediately  to  keep  the  wives 
and  children"- of  the  poor  in  work  in  their  own  houses  ; 
but  it  leaves  no  doubt  that  manufactures  in  England  had 
not  of  themselves  that  tendency  to  self-development 
which  would  encourage  an  enlarging  population.  The 
woollen  manufactures  similarly  appear,  from  the  many 
statutes  upon  them,  to  have  been  vigorous  at  a  fixed 
level,  but  to  have  shown  no  tendency  to  rise  beyond  that 
level.  With  a  fixed  market  and  a  fixed  demand,  pro- 
duction continued  uniform. 

A  few  years  subsequent,  indeed,  to  the  passing  of  the 
Act  which  I  have  quoted,  a  very  curious  complaint  is 
entered  in  the  statute  book,  from  the  surface  of  which 
we  should  gather,  that,  so  far  from  increasing,  manufact- 
ures had  alarmingly  declined.  The  fact  nientioned  may 
bear  aiK^ther  meaning,  and  a  meaning  far  more  favorable 
to  the  state  of  the  country  ;  although,  if  such  a  phe- 
nomenon were  to  occur  at  the  present  time,  it  could 
admit  of  but  one  interpretation.  In  the  18th  and  19th 
of  the  32d  of  Henry  VIII.,  all  the  important  towns  ia 


143  SKETCHES    FROM    .T.   A.   FKOUDB. 

England,  from  the  Tweed  to  the  Land's  End,  are  stated, 
one  by  one,  to  have  fallen  into  serious  decay.  Usually 
when  we  meet  with  language  of  this  kind,  we  suppose  it 
to  mean  nothing  more  than  an  awakening  to  the  con- 
sciousness of  evils  which  had  long  existed,  and  which 
had  escaped  notice  only  because  no  one  was  ahve  to 
them.  In  the  present  instance,  however,  the  language 
was  too  strong  and  too  detailed  to  allow  of  this  explana- 
tion ;  and  the  great  body  of  the  English  towns  un- 
doubtedly were  dechning  in  wealth  and  in  the  number 
of  their  inhabitants.  "  Divers  and  many  beautiful 
houses  of  habitation,"  these  statutes  say,  "  built  in 
tyme  past  within  their  walls  and  liberties,  now  are  fallen 
down  and  decayed,  and  at  this  day  remain  unre-edified, 
and  do  lie  as  desolate  and  vacant  grounds,  many  of  them 
nigh  adjoining  to  the  High-streets,  replenished  with 
much  uncleanness  and  tilth,  with  pits,  sellars,  and  vaults 
lying  open  and  uncovered,  to  the  great  perill  and  danger 
of  the  inhabitants  and  other  the  King's  subjects  passing 
by  the  same  ;  and  some  houses  be  very  weak  and  feeble, 
ready  to  fall  down,  and  therefore  dangerous  to  pass  by, 
to  the  great  decay  and  hinderance  of  the  said  boroughs 
and  towns." 

At  present,  the  decay  of  a  town  implies  the  decay  of 
the  trade  of  the  town  ;  and  the  decay  of  all  towns 
simultaneously  would  imply  a  general  collapse  of  the 
trade  of  the  whole  country.  Walled  towns,  however, 
before  the  Eeformation,  existed  for  other  purposes  than 
as  the  centre  points  of  industry  :  they  existed  for  the 
protection  of  property  and  life  :  and  although  it  is  not 
unlikely  that  the  agitation  of  the  Reformation  itself  did 
to  some  degree  interrupt  the  occupation  of  the  people, 
yet  I  believe  that  the  true  account  of  the  phenomenon 
which  then  so  nmcli  disturbed  the  parhament  is,  that 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  143 

one  of  tlieir  purposes  was  no  longer  required  ;  the  towns 
flagged  for  a  time  because  the  country  had  become 
secure.  The  woollen  manufacture  in  Worcestershire  was 
spreading  into  the  open  country,  and,  doubtless,  in  other 
counties  as  well  ;  and  the  "  beautiful  houses"  which  had 
'fallen  into  decay,  were  those  which,  in  the  old  times  of 
^insecurity,  had  been  occupied  by  wealthy  merchants  and 
tradesmen,  who  were  now  enabled,  by  a  strong  and 
settled  government,  to  dispense  with  the  shelter  of 
^oeked  gates  and  fortified  walls,  and  remove  their  resi- 
dences to  more  convenient  situations.  It  was,  in  fact, 
the  first  symptom  of  the  impending  social  revolution. 
Two  years  before  the  passing  of  this  Act,  the  magniti- 
'C9nt  Heagrave  Hall,  in  Suffolk,  had  been  completed  by 
Sir  Thomas  Kitson,  "mercer  of  London,"  and  Sir 
"Thomas  Kiffeon  was  but  one  of  many  of  the  rising 
merchants  who  were  now  able  to  root  themselves  on  the 
land  by  the  side  of  the  Norman  nobility,  first  to  rival, 
and  then  slowly  to  displace  them. 

This  mighty  change,  however,  was  long  in  silent 
progress  before  it  began  to  tell  on  the  institutions  of  the 
country.  When  city  burghers  bought  estates,  the  law 
insisted  jealously  on  their  accepting  with  tiiem  all  the 
feudal  obligations.  Attempts  to  use  the  land  as  "a 
commodity"  were,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  angrily  re- 
pressed ;  while  again,  in  the  majority  of  instances,  such 
persons  endeavored,  as  they  do  at  present,  to  cover  the 
recent  origin  of  their  families  by  adopting  the  manners 
of  the  nobles,  instead  of  transferring  the  habits  of  the 
towns  to  the  parks  and  chases  of  the  English  counties. 
The  old  English  organization  inaintained  its  full  activity  ; 
and  the  duties  of  property  continued  to  be  for  another 
century  more  considered  than  its  rights. 

Turning,  then,  to  the  tenure  of  land — for  if  we  would 


144  SKETCHES    PROM    J.   A.    FR0UDj5. 

understand  tlie  condition  of  the  people,  it  is  to  this  point 
that  our  first  attention  must  be  directed — we  find  that 
through  the  many  complicated  varieties  of  it  there  was 
one  broad  principle  which  bore  equally  upon  every  class, 
that  the  land  of  England  must  provide  for  the  defence 
of    England.      The   feudal   system,  though    practically 
modified,    was   still   the    organizing    principle    of    the 
nation,  and  the  owner  of   land  was  bound  to  military 
service   for   his     country   whenever   occasion   required. 
Further,  the  land  was  to  be  so  administered,  that  the 
accustomed  number  of  families  supported  by  it  should 
not  be  diminished,  and  that  the  state  should  suffer  no 
injury  from  the  carelessness  or  selfishness  of  the  owners. 
Land  never  was  private  property  in  that  personal  sense 
of  property  in  which  we  speak  of  a  thing  as  our  own, 
with  which  we  may  do  as  we  please  ;  and  in  the  ad- 
ministration of  estates,  as  indeed  in  the  administration 
of  all  property  whatsoever,  duty  to  the  state  was  at  all 
times  supposed  to  override  private  interest  or  inclina- 
tion.    Even    tradesmen,    who   took   advantage    of    the 
fluctuations  of  the  market,  were  rebuked  by  parhament 
for  "  their  greedy  and  covetous  minds,"  "  as  more  re- 
garding their  own  singular  lucre  and  profit  than  the 
commonweal  of  the  Realm  ;' '  and  although  in  an  altered 
world,  neither  industry  nor  enterprise  will  thrive  except 
under  the  stimulus  of  self-interest,  we  may  admire  the 
confidence  which  in  another  age  expected  every  man  to 
prefer  the  advantage  of  the  community  to  his  own.     All 
land  was  held  upon  a  strictly  military  principle.     It  was 
the  representative  of  authority,  and  the  holder  or  the 
owner  took  rank  in  the  army  of  the  state  according  to 
the  nature  of  his  connection  with  it.     It  was  first  broadly 
divided  among  the  great  nobility  holding  immediately 
under  the  crown,  who,  above  and  beyond  the  ownership 


SIXTEENTH    CEXTL'KY    ENGUSHMEX.  1-45 

of  their  private  estates,  were  the  Lords  of  the  Fee 
throughout  their  presidency,  and  possessed  in  right  of  it 
the  services  of  knio-hts  and  e^entlemen  who  held  their 
manors  under  them,  and  who  followed  their  standard  in 
war.  Under  the  lords  of  manors,  again,  small  freeholds 
and  copyholds  were  held  of  various  extent,  often  forty 
shi|ling  and  twenty  shilling  value,  tenanted  l)y  peasant 
occupiers,  who  thus,  on  their  own  land,  lived  as  free 
Epgtishmen,  maintaining  by  their  own  free  labor  them- 
selves and  their  families.  There  was  thus  a  descending 
scale  of  owners,  each  of  whom  possessed  his  separate 
right,  which  the  law  guarded  and  none  might  violate  ; 
yet  no  one  of  whom,  again,  was  independent  of  an 
autiiority  higher  than  himself  ;  and  the  entire  body  of 
the  English  free  possessors  of  the  soil  was  interpenetrated 
by  a  coherent  organization  which  converted  them  into  a 
perpetually  subsisting  army  of  soldiers.  The  extent  of 
land  which  was  held  by  the  petty  freeholders  Avas  very 
large,  and  the  possession  of  it  was  jealously  treasured  ; 
the  private  estates  of  the  nobles  and  gentlemen  were 
either  cultivated  by  their  own  servants,  or  let  out,  as  at 
])resent,  to  free  tenants  ;  or  (in  earlier  times)  were 
occupied  by  villains,  a  class  who,  without  being  bond- 
men, were  expected  to  furnish  further  services  than 
those  of  the  field,  services  which  were  limited  by  the 
law,  and  recognized  by  an  outward  ceremony,  a  solotim 
oath  and  promise  from  the  villain  to  his  li»r<l.  ^'illanage, 
in  the  reign  (A  Henry  VIII.,  Iiud  practically  ceased. 
The  name  of  it  last  appears  upon  the  statute  book  in  the 
early  years  of  the  reign  of  Richard  II..  wlicii  tlie  dis- 
])utes  between  villains  and  their  liege  lords  on  their 
relative  rii^hts  had  furnished  matter  foi-  cumbrous  law- 
suits,  and  by  general  consent  the  relation  liad  merged  of 
itselt'     into   a   more    liberal    form.      Thus    serfdom    had 


146  SKETCHES    FIIOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

merged  or  was  rapidly  merging  into  free  servitude  ;  but 
it  did  not  so  merge  that  laboring  men,  if  they  pleased, 
were  allowed  to  live  in  idleness.  Every  man  was  regi- 
mented somew'here  ;  and  although  the  peasantry,  when 
at  full  age,  were  allowed,  under  restrictions,  their  own 
choice  of  masters,  yet  the  restrictions  both  on  masters 
and  servants  were  so  severe  as  to  prevent  either  from 
taking  advantage  of  the  necessities  of  the  other,  or  from 
terminating  through  caprice  or  levity,  or  for  any  insuffi- 
cient reason,  a  connection  presumed  to  be  permanent. 

Through  all  these  arrangements  a  single  aim  is  visible, 
that  every  man  in  England  should  have  his  definite  place 
and  definite  duty  assigned  to  him,  and  that  no  human 
being  should  be  at  liberty  to  lead  at  his  own  pleasure  an 
unaccountable  existence.  The  discipline  of  an  army  was 
transferred  to  the  details  of  social  life,  and  it  issued  in  a 
chivalrous  perception  of  the  meaning  of  the  word  duty, 
and  in  the  old  characteristic  spirit  of  English  loyalty. 

From  the  regulations  with  respect  to  land,  a  coarser 
advantage  was  also  derived,  of  a  kind  which  at  the 
present  time  will  be  effectively  appreciated.  It  is  a 
common  uiatter  of  dispute  whether  landed  estates  should 
be  large  or  small  ;  whether  it  is  better  that  the  land 
should  be  divided  among  small  proprietors,  cultivating 
their  OAvn  ground,  or  that  it  should  follow  its  present 
tendency,  and  be  shared  by  a  limited  and  constantly 
diminishing  number  of  wealthy  landlords.  The  advocates 
for  a  peasant  proprietary  tell  us  truly,  that  a  landed 
monopoly  is  dangerous  ;  that  the  possession  of  a  spot  of 
ground,  though  it  be  but  a  few  acres,  is  the  best  security 
for  loj^alty,  giving  the  state  a  pledge  for  its  owner,  and 
creating  in  the  body  of  the  nation  a  free,  vigorous,  and 
manly  spirit.  The  advocates  for  the  large  estate  tell  us 
that  the  masses  are  too  ill-educated  to  be  trusted  with 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ESOLISHMEN.  147 

independence  ;  that  without  authority  over  thern,  these 
small  ^proprietors  become  wasteful,  careless,  improvi- 
dent ;  that  the  free  spirit  becomes  a  democratic  and 
dangerous  spirit  ;  and  finally,  that  the  resources  of  the 
land  cannot  properly  be  brought  out  by  men  without 
capital  to  cultivate  it.  Either  theory  is  plausible.  The 
ativocates  of  both  can  support  their  arguments  with  an 
appeal  to  experience  ;  and  the  verdict  of  fact  has  not  as 
yet  been  pronounced  emphatically. 

,  The  problem  will  be  resolved  in  the  future  history  of 
this  country.  It  was  also  nobly  arid  skilfully  resolved 
in  the  past.  The  knights  and  nobles  retained  the  au- 
thority and  power  which  was  attached  to  the  lordships  of 
th^  fees.  They  retained  extensive  estates  in  their  own 
litmds  or  in  the  occupation  of  their  immediate  tenants  ; 
but  the  large*proportion  of  the  lands  was  granted  out  by 
them  to  smaller  owners,  and  the  expenditure  of  their 
own  incomes  in  the  wages  and  nuiintenance  of  their  vast 
retinues,  left  but  a  small  nuirgin  for  indulgence  in 
luxuries.  The  necessities  of  their  position  obliged  them 
to  regai'd  their  property  rather  as  a  revenue  to  be  ad- 
ministered in  trust,  tlian  as  a  "  fortune"'  to  be  expended 
in  indulgence.  Before  the  Reformation,  while  the 
differences  of  social  degree  were  enormous,  the  differ- 
ences in  habits  of  life  were  comparatively  slight,  and  the 
])ractice  of  men  in  these  things  was  curiously  the  reverse 
of  onr  own.  Dress,  which  now  scarcely  suffices  to  dis- 
tinguish the  master  from  his  servant,  was  tlicii  the 
symbol  of  rank,  presci'ibed  by  statute  to  the  various 
orders  (jf  society  as  strictly  as  the  regimental  unifoi'in  to 
officers  and  privates  ;  diet  also  was  prescril>ed,  and  with 
equal  strictness  ;  but  the  diet  of  the  nobleman  was 
ordered  down  to  a  level  which  was  then  within  the  reach 
of  the  poorest  laborer.      In    1  •';;*.»>,  tlie  following  law  wai 


148  SKKTCIIKS    FROM    J.    A.    FKOUDE. 

enacted  by  tlie  Parliament  of  Edward  III.  :   "Where- 
as, heretofore  through  the  excessive  and  over-many  sorts 
of  costly  meats  which  the  people  of  this  Realm  have 
used  more  thaii   elsewhere,  many  mischiefs  have  hap- 
pened to  the  people  of  this  Realm— for  the  great  men 
by  these  excesses  have  been  sore  grieved  ;  and  the  lesser 
people,  who  only  endeavor  to  iinitate  the  great  ones  in 
such  sort  of   meats,   are  much  impoverished,  whereby 
they  are  not  able  to  aid  themselves,  nor  their  liege  lord, 
in  time  of  need,  as  they  ought  ;  and  many  other  evils 
have  happened,  as  well  to  their  souls  as  their  bodies — 
our  Lord  the  King,  desiring  the  common  profit  as  well 
of  the  great  men  as  of  the  common  people  of  his  Realm, 
and   considering   the    evils,    grievances,    and   mischiefs 
aforesaid,  by  the  common  assent  of  the  prelates,  earls, 
barons,  and  other  nobles  of  his  said  Realm,  and  of  the 
commons  of  the  same  Realm,  hath  ordained  and  estab- 
lished that  no  man,  of  what  estate  or  condition  soever 
lie  be,  shall  canse  himself  to  be  served,  in  his  house  or 
elsewhere,  at  dinner,  meal,  or  supper,  or  at  any  other 
time,  with  more  than  two  courses,  and  each  mess  of  two 
sorts  of  victuals  at  the  utmost,  be  it  of  flesh  or  fish,  with 
the  connnon  sorts  of  pottage,  without  sauce  or  any  other 
sorts  of  victuals.     And  if  any  man  choose  to  have  sauce 
for  his  mess,  he  may,  jn-ovided  it  be  not  made  at  great 
cost  ;  and  if  fish  or  flesli  be  to  be  mixed  therein,  it  shall 
be  of  two  sorts  only  at  the  utmost,  either  fish  or  flesh, 
and  shall  stand  instead  of  a  mess,  except  only  on  the 
principal  feasts  of  the  year,  on  which  days  every  man 
may  be  served  with  three  courses  at  the   utmost,  after 
the  manner  aforesaid." 

Sumptuary  laws  are  among  the  exploded  fallacies 
which  we  have  outgrown,  and  we  smile  at  the  unwisdom 
whicli  could  expect  to  regulate   private  habits  and  man- 


SIXTEEXTIT    CRXTl-llY    l^XOLTSHMKX.  149 

ners  by  statute.  Yet  some  statutes  may  be  of  luor.il 
authority  wlien  they  cannot  be  actually  enforced,  and 
may  have  been  regarded,  even  at  the  time  at  which  they 
were  issued,  rather  as  an  authoritative  declaration  of 
^^wliat  wise  and  good  men  considered  to  be  right,  than  as 
laws  to  which  obedience  could  be  compelled.      This  act, 

^f.^  any  ratCj  witnesses  to  what  was  then  thought  to  be 
right  by  "  the  great  persons"  of  the  English  realm  ;  and 
when  great  persons  will  .sul)mit  theni'^elves  of  their  free 

^Avill  to  regulations  which  restrict  their  private  indul- 
gence, they  are  in  little  danger  of  disloyalty  from  those 
whom  fortune  has  placed  below  them. 

Such  is  one  aspect  of  these  old  arrangements  ;  it  is 
lymecessary  to  say  that  with  these,  as  with  all  other 
institutions  created  and  worked  by  hunum  beings,  the 
pictnre  admits  of  being  i-eversed.  ^Yhen  by  the  accident 
of  birth  men  are  placed  in  a  position  of  authority,  no 
care  in  tlieir  training  will  prevent  it  from  falling  often 
to  singularly  unfit  persons.  The  command  of  a  per- 
manent military  force  was  a  temptation  to  ambition,  to 
avarice,  or  hatred,  to  the  indulgence  of  priv^ate  pi(pies 
and  jealousies,  to  political  discontent  on  private  and 
personal  grounds.  A  combination  of  three  or  four  of 
the  leading  nobles  was  sufficient,  whi'ii  an  incapable 
prince  sate  on  the  throne,  to  effect  a  revolution  ;  and 
the  rival  claims  of  the  houses  uf  York  and  Lancaster  to 
the  crown,  took  the  form  of  a  war  unequalled  in  liistory 
for  its  fierce  and  determined  maliu-nancv,  tlio  whole 
nation  tearing  itself  in  pieces  in  a  (piarrel  in  which  no 
principle  was  at  stake,  and  no  national  object  was  to  be 
gained.  A  more  terrible  misfortune  never  befell  either 
this  or  any  other  country,  and  it  was  mad(;  possible 
only  in  virtue  of  that  loyalty  with  which  the  people 
followed  the  standard,  through  good  and  evil,  of  their 


ir)0  SKETCHES    FROlVf   ,T.  A.   FROUIJE. 

feudal  superiors.  It  is  still  a  question,  however,  whether 
the  good  or  the  evil  of  the  system  predominated  ;  and 
the  answer  to  sucli  question  is  the  more  difficult  because 
we  have  no  criterion  by  which,  in  these  matters,  degrees 
of  good  and  evil  admit  of  being  measured.  Arising  out 
of  the  character  of  the  nation,  it  reflected  this  character 
in  all  its  peculiarities  ;  and  there  is  something  truly 
noble  in  the  coherence  of  society  upon  principles  of 
fidelity.  Fidelity  of  man  to  man  is  among  the  rarest 
excellences  of  humanity,  and  we  can  tolerate  large  evils 
which  arise  out  of  such  a  cause.  Under  the  feudal 
system  men  were  held  together  by  oaths,  free  acknowl- 
edgments, and  reciprocal  obligations,  entered  into  by  all 
ranks,  high  and  low,  binding  servants  to  their  masters, 
as  well  as  nobles  to  their  kings  ;  and  in  the  frequent 
forms  of  the  language  in  which  the  oaths  were  sworn  we 
cannot  choose  but  see  that  we  have  lost  something  in 
exchanging  these  ties  for  the  harslier  connecting  links  of 
mutual  self-interest. 

"  When  a  freeman  shall  do  fealty  to  his  lord,"  the 
statute  says,  "  he  shall  hold  his  right  hand  upon  the  book, 
and  shall  say  thus  : — Hear  you,  my  lord,  that  I  shall 
be  to  you  both  faithful  and  true,  and  shall  owe  my  faith 
to  you  for  the  land  that  I  hold,  and  lawfully  shall  do 
such  customs  and  services  as  my  duty  is  to  you,  at  the 
times  assigned,  so  help  me  God  and  all  his  saints." 

"  The  villain,"  also,  "  when  he  shall  do  fealty  to  his 
lord,  shall  hold  his  right  hand  over  the  book,  and  shall 
say  :— Hear  you,  my  lord,  that  I  from  tins  day  forth  unto 
you  shall  be  true  and  faithful,  and  shall  owe  you  fealty 
for  the  land  which  I  hold  of  you  in  villanage  ;  and  that 
no  evil  or  damage  will  I  see  concerning  you,  but  I  will 
defend  and  warn  you  to  my  power.  So  help  me  God 
and  all  his  saints. ' ' 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  151 

Again,  in  the  distribution  of  tlie  produce  of  liind, 
men  dealt  fairly  and  justly  with  each  other  ;  and  in  the 
material  condition  of  the  bulk  of  the  people  there  is  a 
fair  evidence  that  the  system  worked  efficiently  and 
well.  It  worked  well  for  the  support  of  a  sturdy,  high 
''hearted  race,  sound  in  body  and  fierce  in  spirit,  and  fur- 
.^ished  with  thews  and  sinews  which,  under  the  stimulus 

"^'Of- those  "licrcat  shins  of  beef,"  their  common  diet,  were 
tli€  wonder  of  the  age.  "  What  comyn  folke  in  all  this 
''vE.orld,"  says  a  state  paper  in  1515,  "  may  compare  with 
the  comyns  of  England  in  riches,  freedom,  lil)erty,  wel- 
fare, and  all  prosperity  ?  What  comyn  folke  is  so  mighty, 
60  strong  in  the  felde,  as  the  comyns  of  England  V     The 

'  relative  numbers  of  the  French  and  English  armies 
which  fought  at  Cressy  and  Agincourt  may  have  been 
exaggerated^  Imt  no  allowance  for  exaggeration  will 
affect  the  greatness  of  those  exploits  ;  and  in  stories  of 
authentic  actions  under  Henry  VIII. ,  where  the  accu- 
racy of  the  account  is  undeniable,  no  disparity  of  force 
made  Englishmen  shriidv  from  enemies  wherever  they 
could  meet  them.  A2;ain  and  aiii-ain  a  few  thousand 
of  them  carried  dismay  into  the  heart  of  France,  Four 
luindred  adventurers,  vagabond  apprentices,  from  Lon- 
don, who  formed  a  volunteer  corps  in  the  Calais  gar- 
rison, were  for  years  the  terror  of  Normandy.  In  the 
very  frolic  of  conscious  power  they  fought  and  phm- 
dered,  without  pny,  without  reward,  except  what  they 
could  win  for  tlieniselves  ;  and  when  they  fell  at  last 
they  fell  only  when  surrounded  by  six  times  their 
number,  and  were  cut  to  pieces  in  careless  desperation. 
Invariably,  ])y  fri(;nd  and  enemy  alike,  the  English  are 
described  as  the  fiercest  people  in  all  Europe  (the  Eng- 
lish wild  beasts,  Benvenuto  Cellini  calls  them)  ;  and  this 
great  physical  power  they  owed  to  the  profuse  abundance 


152  vSKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

ill  wliicli  they  lived,  and  to  tlie  soldier's  training  in 
wliicli  every  man  of  them  was  bred  from  childhood. 

The  state  of  the  working  classes  can,  however,  be 
more  certainly  determined  by  a  comparison  of  their 
wages  with  the  prices  of  food.  Both  were  regnlated,  so 
far  as  regulation  was  possible,  by  act  of  parliament,  and 
we  have  therefore  data  of  the  clearest  kind  by  which  to 
judge.  The  majority  of  agricultural  laborers  lived,  as  I 
have  said,  in  tlie  houses  of  their  employers  ;  this,  how- 
ever, was  not  the  case  with  all,  and  if  we  can  satisfy 
ourselves  as  to  the  rate  at  which  those  among  the  poor 
were  able  to  live  who  had  cottages  of  their  own,  we  may 
be  assured  that  the  rest  did  not  live  worse  at  their 
masters'  tables. 

Wheat,  the  price  of  which  necessarily  varied,  averaged 
in  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century  tenpence  the 
bushel  ;  barley  averaging  at  the  same  time  three  shillings 
the  quarter.  With  wheat  the  fluctuation  was  excessive  ; 
a  table  of  its  possible  variations  describes  it  as  ranging 
from  eighteenpence  the  quarter  to  twenty  shilhngs  ;  the 
average,  however,  being  six  and  eightpence.  When  the 
price  was  above  this  sum,  the  merchants  might  import 
to  bring  it  down  ;  when  it  was  below  this  price,  the 
farmers  were  allowed  to  export  to  the  foreign  markets. 
The  same  scale,  with  a  scarcely  appreciable  tendency  to 
rise,  continued  to  hold  until  the  disturbance  in  the  value 
of  the  currency.  In  the  twelve  years  from  1551  to 
1562,  although  once  before  harvest  wheat  rose  to  the 
extraordinary  price  of  forty-five  shillings  a  quarter,  it 
fell  immediately  after  to  five  shillings  and  four.  Six 
and  eightpence  continued  to  be  considered  in  parliament 
as  the  average  ;  and  on  tlie  whole  it  seems  to  have  been 
maintained  for  that  time  with  little  variation. 

Beef  and  pork  were  a  halfpenny  a  pound,  mutton  was 


K'^ 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  15 

tliree  farthings.  They  were  fixed  at  these  prices  by  the 
3d  of  the  24  of  lien.  VIII.  But  the  act  was  unpopular 
both  with  buyers  and  with  sellers.  The  old  practice  had 
been  to  sell  in  the  gross,  and  under  that  arrangement 
the  rates  had  been  generally  lower.  Stow  says  :  "It 
\yas  this  year  enacted  that  butchers  should  sell  their  beef 
.aod  mutton  by  weight — beef  for  a  halfpenny  the  pound. 
and  mutton  for  three  farthings  ;  which  being  devised 
fcrr;the  great  connnodity  of  the  realm  (as  it  was  thought), 
hath  proved  far  otherwise  :  for  at  that  time  fat  oxen 
were  sold  for  six  and  twenty  shillings  and  eightpence  the 
piece  ;  fat  wethers  for  three  shillings  and  fourpence  the 
piece  ;  fat  calves  at  a  like  price  ;  and  fat  lambs  for 
twelvepence.  The  butchers  of  London  sold  penny 
pieces  of  beef  for  the  relief  of  the  poor — every  piece 
two  pound  Ttnd  a  half,  sometimes  three  pound  for  a 
penny  ;  and  thirteen  and  sometimes  fourteen  of  these 
})ieces  for  twelvepence  ;  nnitton  eightpence  the  quarter, 
and  an  hundred  weight  of  beef  for  four  siiillings  and 
eightpence."  The  act  was  repealed  in  consequence  of 
the  complaints  against  it,  butsthe  prices  never  fell  again 
to  what  they  had  been,  although  beef  sold  in  the  gross 
could  still  be  had  fo)*  a  halfpenny  a  pound  in  1570. 
Other  articles  of  food  were  in  the  same  proportion.  The 
best  pig  or  goose  in  a  country  market  could  be  bought 
for  fourpence  ;  a  good  capon  for  threepence  or  four- 
j)eiice  ;  a  chicken  for  a  pemiy  ;  a  hen  for  twopence. 

Strong  beer,  such  as  we  now  buy  for  eightcenpence 
a  gallon,  was  then  a  penny  a  gallon  ;  and  table-beer  less 
than  a  halfpenny.  French  and  German  wines  were 
eightpence  a  gallon  ;  Spanish  and  Portuguese  wines  a 
shilling.  This  was  tlie  highest  pi'icc  at  which  tlu-  best 
wines  might  be  sold  ;  and  if  there  was  any  fault  in 
quality  or  quantity,  the  dealers  forfeited  four  times  the 


154  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

amount.  Kent,  another  important  consideration,  cannot 
be  fixed  so  accurately,  for  parliament  did  not  interfere 
with  it.  Here,  however,  we  are  not  without  very  toler- 
able information.  "  My  father,"  says  Latimer,  "  was  a 
yeoman,  and  had  no  lands  of  his  own  ;  only  he  had  a 
farm  of  three  or  four  pounds  hy  the  year  at  the  utter- 
most, and  hereupon  he  tilled  so  nmch  as  kept  half  a 
dozen  men.  He  had  walk  for  a  hundred  sheep,  and  my 
mother  milked  thirty  kine.  He  was  able,  and  did  find 
the  king  a  harness  with  himself  and  his  horse.  I  re- 
member that  I  buckled  on  his  harness  when  he  went  to 
Blackheath  field.  He  kept  me  to  school,  or  else  I  had 
not  been  able  to  have  preached  before  the  King's 
Majesty  now.  He  married  my  sisters  with  five  pounds, 
or  twenty  nobles,  each,  having  brought  them  up  in 
godliness  and  fear  of  God.  He  kept  hospitality  for  his 
poor  neighbors,  and  some  alms  he  gave  to  the  poor  ;  and 
all  this  he  did  of  the  said  farm."  If  "three  or  four 
pounds  at  the  uttermost"  was  the  rent  of  a  farm  yield- 
ing such  results,  the  rent  of  laborers'  cottages  is  not 
likely  to  have  been  considerable. 

Some  uncertainty  is  unavoidable  in  all  calculations  of  the 
present  nature  ;  yet  after  making  the  utmost  allowance 
for  errors,  we  may  conclude  from  such  a  table  of  prices 
that  a  penny,  in  terms  of  the  laborer's  necessities,  must 
have  been  nearly  equal  in  the  reign  of  Henry  YIII.  to 
the  present  shilling.  For  a  penny,  at  the  time  of  which 
1  write,  the  laborer  could  buy  as  much  bread,  beef, 
beer,  and  wine — he  could  do  as  much  toward  finding 
lodging  for  himself  and  his  family — as  the  laborer  of  the 
nineteenth  century  can  for  a  shilling.  I  do  not  see  that 
this  admits  of  question.  Turning,  then,  to  the  table  of 
wages,  it  will  be  easy  to  ascertain  his  position.  By  the 
3d  of  the  6th  of  Henry  VIII.  it  was  enacted  that  master 


SIXTEEXTII    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  155 

carpenters,  masons,  bricklayers,  tjlers,  plumbers,  glaziers, 
joiners,  and  other  emplo3'ers  of  such  skilled  workmen, 
should  give  to  each  of  their  journeymen,  if  no  meat  or 
drink  was  allowed,  sixpence  a  day  for  the  half  year, 
tivepence  a  day  for  the  other  half  ;  or  fiveijence -half- 
penny for  the  yearly  average.  The  common  laborers 
w$re  to  receive  fourpence  a  day  for  half  the  year,  for 
the  remaining  half,  threepence.  In  the  harvest  months 
they  were  allowed  to  work  by  the  piece,  and  might  earn 
oohsiderably  more  ;  so  that,  in  fact  (and  this  was  the 
rate  at  M'hieh  their  wages  were  usually  estimated),  the 
day  laborer,  if  in  full  employment,  received  on  an 
average  fourpence  a  day  for  the  whole  year.  Allowing 
a  deduction  of  one  day  in  a  fortnight  for  a  saint's  day  or 
a  holiday,  he  received,  therefore,  steadily  and  regularly, 
if  well  conducted,  an  equivalent  of  something  near  to 
twenty  sliillings  a  week,  the  wages  at  preseht  paid  in 
English  colonies  ;  and  this  is  far  from  being  a  full 
account  of  his  advantages.  Except  in  rare  instances,  the 
agricultural  laborer  held  land  in  connection  with  his 
house,  while  in  most  parishes,  if  not  in  all,  there  were 
large  ranges  of  connnon  and  uninclosed  forest  land  which 
furnished  his  fuel  to  hiiu  gratis,  where  pigs  might  I'ange, 
and  ducks  and  geese  ;  where,  if  he  could  afford  a  cow, 
he  was  in  no  danger  of  being  unable  to  feed  it  ;  and  so 
important  was  this  privilege  considered,  that  when  the 
commons  began  to  be  largely  inclosed,  parliament  in- 
sisted that  the  working-man  should  iu)t  be  without  some 
piece  of  ground  on  which  he  could  employ  his  own  and 
his  family's  industry.  By  the  7th  of  the  31st  of  Eliza- 
beth, it  was  ordered  that  no  cottage  should  be  built  for 
residence  without  four  acres  of  land  at  lowest  being 
attached  to  it  for  the  sole  use  of  the  occupants  of  such 
cottage. 


ITiO  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FROUDE. 

It  will,  perhaps,  be  supposed  that  such  comparative 
prosperity  of  labor  was  the  result  of  the  condition  of  the 
market  in  which  it  was  sold,  that  the  demand  for  labor 
was  large  and  the  supply  limited,  and  that  the  state  of 
England  in  the  sixteenth  century  was  analogous  to  that 
of  Australia  or  Canada  at  the  present  time.  And  so 
long  as  we  confine  our  view  to  the  question  of  wages 
alone,  it  is  undoubted  that  legislation  was  in  favor  of  the 
employer.  The  Wages  Act  of  Henry  YIII.  was  un- 
popular with  the  laborers,  and  was  held  to  deprive  them 
of  an  opportunity  of  making  better  terms  for  themselves. 
But  we  shall  fall  into  extreme  error  if  we  translate  into 
the  language  of  modern  political  economy  the  social 
features  of  a  state  of  things  which  in  r.o  way  corre- 
sponded to  our  own.  There  was  this  essential  difference, 
that  labor  was  not  looked  upon  as  a  market  commodity  ; 
the  goverinnent  (whether  wisely  or  not,  I  do  not  pre- 
sume to  determine)  attempting  to  portion  out  the  rights 
of  the  various  classes  of  society  by  the  rule,  not  of 
economy,  but  of  equity.  Statesmen  did  not  care  for  the 
accumulation  of  capital  ;  they  desired  to  see  the  physical 
well-being  of  all  classes  of  the  commonwealth  main- 
tained  at  the  highest  degree  which  the  producing  power 
of  the  country  admitted  ;  and  [)opulation  and  production 
remaining  stationary,  they  were  able  to  do  it.  This  was 
their  object,  and  they  were  supported  in  it  by  a  pow- 
erful and  efficient  majority  of  the  nation.  On  the 
one  side  parliamcTit  interfered  to  protect  enq^loyers 
against  their  laborers  ;  but  it  was  equally  determined 
that  employers  should  not  be  allowed  to  abuse  their 
opportunities  ;  and  this  directly  appears  from  the  4th  of 
the  5tli  of  Elizabeth,  by  which,  on  the  most  trifling 
appearance  of  a  depreciation  in  the  currency,  it  was 
declared  that  the  laboring  man  could  no  longer  live  on 


SIXTEENTH    CENTIRY    i:N(i  LISHMEN".  157 

the  wages  assigned  to  liim  by  the  act  of  Henrj  ;  and  a 
sHding  scale  was  instituted  by  which,  for  the  future, 
wages  should  be  adjusted  to  the  price  of  food. 

The  same  conclusion  may  be  gathered  also,  indirectly, 
from  other  acts,  interfering  imperiously  with  the  rights 
of  property  Mhere  a  disposition  showed  itself  to  execcise 
tlrem  selfishly.  The  city  merchants,  as  I  have  said,  M-ere 
becoming  landowners  ;  and  some  of  them  attempted  to 
apply  the  rules  of  trade  to  the  management  of  landed 
estates.  While  wages  were  ruled  so  high,  it  answered 
better  as  a  speculation  to  convert  arable  land  into  past- 
ure ;  but  the  law  innnediately  stepped  in  to  prevent  a 
proceeding  which  it  regarded  as  petty  treason  to  the 
eoinm  on  wealth.  Self-protection  is  the  first  law  of  life  ; 
aild  the  country  relying  for  its  defence  on  an  able-bodied 
population,  erenly  distributed,  ready  at  any  moment  to 
be  called  into  action,  either  against  foreign  invasion  or 
civil  disturbance,  it  could  not  permit  the  owners  of  land 
to  pursue  for  their  own  benefit  a  course  of  action  which 
threatened  to  weaken  its  garrisons.  It  is  not  often  that 
we  are  able  to  test  the  M'isdom  of  legislation  by  specific 
results  so  clearly  as  in  the  present  instance.  The  first 
attempts  of  tljc  kind  which  I  have  described  were  made 
in  the  Isle  of  Wight,  early  in  the  reign  of  Henry  Yll. 
Lying  so  directly  exposed  to  attacks  from  France,  the 
Isle  of  Wight  was  a  ])lace  which  it  was  peculiarly  im- 
portant to  keep  in  a  state  of  defence,  and  the  following 
act  was  therefore  tlie  consecpience  : 

"  Forasmuch  as  it  is  to  the  surety  of  the  Realm  of 
England  that  tlic  U]g  of  Wight,  in  the  county  of  South- 
ampton, l)e  well  inhabited  witli  English  people,  for  the 
defence  as  well  of  our  antient  enemies  of  the  Realm  of 
France  as  of  otlur  ]>;irties  ;  the  wliicli  Isle  is  late  de- 
caved  of  iK'oplr  1)V  reason  that  manv  towns  an<1  \'iUages 


158  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FROUDE. 

have  been  let  down,  and  the  fields  dyked  and  made 
pasture  for  beasts  and  cattle,  and  also  many  dwelling- 
places,  farms,  and  farmholds  have  of  late  time  been  used 
to  be  taken  into  one  man's  hold  and  hands,  that  of 
old  time  were  wont  to  be  in  many  several  persons' 
holds  and  hands,  and  many  several  households  kept 
in  them  ;  and  thereby  much  people  multiplied,  and  the 
same  Isle  thereby  well  inhabited,  which  now,  by  the 
occasion  aforesaid,  is  desolate  and  not  inhabited,  but 
occupied  with  beasts  and  cattle,  so  that  if  hasty  remedy 
be  not  provided,  that  Isle  cannot  long  be  kept  and 
defended,  but  open  and  ready  to  the  hands  of  the  king's 
enemies,  which  God  forbid.  For  remedy  hereof,  it  is 
ordained  and  enacted  that  no  manner  of  person,  of  what 
estate,  degree,  or  condition  soever,  shall  take  any  several 
farms  more  than  one,  whereof  the  yearly  value  shall  not 
exceed  the  sum  of  ten  marks  ;  and  if  any  several  leases 
afore  this  time  have  been  made  to  any  person  or  persons 
of  divers  and  sundry'  farmholds,  whereof  the  yearly  value 
shall  exceed  that  sum,  then  the  said  person  or  persons 
shall  choose  one  farmhold  at  his  pleasure,  and  the 
remnant  of  his  leases  shall  be  utterly  void.'' 

An  act,  tyrannical  in  form,  was  singularly  justified  by 
its  consequences.  The  farms  were  rebuilt,  the  lands 
reploughed,  the  island  repeopled  ;  and  in  1546,  when  a 
French  army  of  sixty  thousand  men  attempted  to  effect 
a  landing  at  St.  Helen's,  tliey  were  defeated  and  driven 
off  by  the  militia  of  the  island  and  a  few  levies  trans- 
p<u'ted  from  Hampshire  and  the  adojining  counties. 

The  money-making  spirit,  however,  lay  too  deep  to 
be  checked  so  readily.  The  trading  classes  were  grow- 
iiio;  rich  under  the  strono;  rule  of  the  Tudors.  Increasins^ 
numbers  of  them  were  buying  or  renting  land  ;  and  the 
bymptoms    complained   of   broke    out    in   the   following 


SIXTEENTH    CEXTIKY    EXdLISHMEN".  15'.) 

reign  in  nianj  parts  of  England.  They  eonld  not  choose 
hut  break  out  indeed  ;  for  thej  were  the  outward 
marks  of  a  vital  change  which  was  undermining  the 
feudal  constitution,  and  would  bj  and  by  revolution- 
ize and  destroy  it.  Such  symptoms  it  was  impossible 
to  extinguish  ;  but  the  government  wrestled  long  and 
powerfully  to  hold  down  the  new  sj^irit  ;  and  they 
fought  agains't  it  successfully,  till  the  old  order  of  things 
iiajd  finished  its  work,  and  the  time  was  come  for  it  to 

^depart.  By  the  1st  of  the  7th  of  Henry  Vlll.,  the  laws 
of  feudal  tenure  were  put  in  force  against  the  landed 
traders.  Wherever  lands  were  converted  from  tillage  to 
pasture,  the  lords  of  the  fee  had  authority  to  seize  half 

""  gi  all  profits  until  the  farm-buildings  were  reconstructed. 
If  the  immediate  lord  did  not  do  his  duty,  the  lord  next 
above  him  Was  to  do  it  ;  and  the  evil  still  increasing,  the 
act,  twenty  years  later,  was  extended  further,  and  the 
king  had  power  to  seize.  Nor  was  this  all.  Sheep- 
farming  had  become  an  integral  branch  of  business  ;  and 
falling  into  the  hands  of  men  who  understood  each 
other,  it  had  been  made  a  monopoly,  affecting  seriously 
the  prices  of  wool  and  mutton.  Stronger  measures  were 
therefore  now  taken,  and  the  class  to  which  the  offenders 
belonged  was  especially  pointed  out  by  parliament. 

"  Whereas,"  says  the  13th  of  the  25th  of  Ilem-y 
VIII.,  "  divers  and  sundry  persons  of  the  king's  sub- 
jects of  this  Healm,  to  whom  God  of  his  goodness  hath 
disposed  great  plenty  and  abundance  of  moveable  sub- 
stance, now  of  late,  within  few  years,  have  daily  studied, 
practised,  and  invented  ways  and  means  how  they  might 
r.ccumulatc  and  gather  ttigether  into  few  hands,  as  well 
great  multitude  of  farms  as  great  plenty  of  cattle,  and  in 
especial,  sheep,  putting  sudi  lands  as  they  can  get  to 
pasture  and  m.it  to  tillage;  ;   wlicivby  they  have  not  only 


li'iO  SKETCH  KS    FliOM    J.    A.    JUOIDE. 

pulled  down  clmrches  and  towns  and  enlianced  the  old 
rates  of  the  rents  of  the  possessions  of  this  Realm,  or  else 
brought  it  to  such  excess! v^e  fines  that  no  poor  man  is 
able  to  meddle  with  it,  but  also  liave  raised  and  enhanced 
the  prices  of  all  manner  of  corn,  cattle,  wool,  pigs, 
geese,  hens,  chickens,  eggs,  and  such  other  commodities, 
almost  double  above  the  prices  which  hath  been  accus- 
tomed, by  reason  whereof  a  marvellous  multitude  of  the 
poor  people  of  this  realm  be  not  able  to  provide  meat, 
drink,  and  clothes  necessary  for  themselves,  their  wives, 
and  children,  but  be  so  discouraged  with  misery  and 
poverty,  that  they  fall  daily  to  theft,  robbery,  and  other 
inconv^eniences,  or  pitifully  die  for  hunger  and  cold  ; 
and  it  is  thought  by  the  king's  humble  and  loving  sub- 
jects, that  one  of  the  greatest  occasions  that  moveth 
those  greedy  and  covetous  people  so  to  accumulate  and 
keep  in  their  hands  such  great  portions  and  parts  of  the 
lands  of  this  Realm  from  the  occupying  of  the  poor 
husbandmen,  and  so  to  use  it  in  pasture  and  not  in 
tillage,  is  the  great  profit  that  cometh  of  sheep  which  be 
now  come  into  a  few  persons'  hands,  in  respect  of  the 
whole  number  of  the  king's  subjects  ;  it  is  hereby 
enacted,  that  no  person  shall  have  or  keep  on  lands  not 
their  own  inheritance  more  than  2000  sheep  ;  that  no 
]->erson  shall  occupy  more  than  two  farms  ;  and  that  the 
10th  of  the  4th  of  Henry  YII.,  and  those  other  acts 
obliging  the  lords  of  the  fees  to  do  their  duty,  shall  be 
re-enacted  and  enforced." 

By  these  measures  the  money-making  spirit  was  for  a 
time  driven  back,  and  the  country  resumed  its  natural 
course.  I  am  not  concerned  to  defend  the  economic 
wisdom  of  such  proceedings  ;  but  they  prove,  I  think, 
('(.nclusively,  that  the  laboring  classes  owed  their  ad- 
\  aiitagcs  not  to  the  condition  of  the  labor  market,  but  to 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  ICI 

the  care  of  the  state  ;  and  that  when  the  state  relaxed 
its  supervision,  or  failed  to  enforce  its  regulations,  the 
laborers  being  left  to  the  market  chances,  sank  instantly 
in  the  unequal  struggle  with  capital. 

The  government,  however,  remained  strong  enough 
to  hold  its  ground  (except  during  the  discreditable  inter- 
liK^le  of  the  reign  of  Edward  VI.)  for  the  first  three 
ijuarters  of  the-  century  ;  and  until  that  time  the  working 
classes  of  this  country  remained  in  a  condition  more  than 
pr^perous.  They  enjoyed  an  abundance  far  beyond 
what  in  general  falls  to  the  lot  of  that  order  in  long- 
settled  countries  ;  incomparably  beyond  what  the  same 
class  were  enjoying  at  that  very  time  in  Germany  or 
France.  The  laws  secured  them  ;  and  that  the  laws 
were  put  in  force  we  have  the  direct  evidence  of  siicces- 
sive  acts  of  fcke  legislature  justifying  the  general  policy 
by  its  success  ;  and  we  have  also  the  indirect  evidence 
of  the  contented  loyalty  of  the  great  body  of  the  people 
at  a  time  when,  if  they  had  been  discontented,  they 
held  in  their  own  hands  the  means  of  asserting  what  the 
law  acknowledged  to  be  their  right.  The  government 
had  no  power  to  compel  submission  to  injustice,  as  was 
proved  by  the  fate  of  an  attempt  to  levy  a  "  benevo- 
lence" by  force,  in  1525.  The  people  resisted  with  a 
determination  against  which  the  crown  commissioners 
were  unable  to  contend,  and  the  scheme  ended  with  an 
acknowledgment  of  fault  by  Henry,  who  retired  with  a 
good  grace  from  an  impossible  position.  If  the  peas- 
antry had  been  suffering  under  any  real  grievances,  we 
should  not  have  failed  to  have  heard  of  them  wlien  the 
religious  rebcillions  furnished  so  fair  an  opi^ortunity  to 
press  those  grievances  forward.  Complaint  was  loud 
enough  wlien  complaint  was  just,  under  flic  Somei-sct 
protectorate. 


163  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A     FROUDE. 

The  incomes  of  the  great  nobles  cannot  be  determined, 
for  they  varied  probably  as  much  as  they  vary  now. 
Under  Henry  IV.  the  average  income  of  an  earl  was 
estimated  at  £2000  a  year.  Under  Henry  YIII.  the 
great  Duke  of  Buckingham,  the  wealthiest  English 
peer,  had  £6000.  And  the  income  of  the  x\rchbisliop 
of  Canterbury  was  rated  at  the  same  amount.  But  the 
estabhshments  of  such  men  were  enormous,  their  ordina- 
ry retinues  in  time  of  peace  consisting  of  many  hundred 
persons  ;  and  in  war,  when  the  duties  of  a  nobleman 
called  him  to  the  held,  although  in  theory  his  followers 
were  paid  by  the  crown,  yet  the  grants  of  parliament 
were  on  so  small  a  scale  that  the  theory  was  seldom 
converted  into  fact,  and  a  large  share  of  the  expenses 
was  paid  often  out  of  private  purses.  The  Duke  of 
Korfolk,  in  the  Scotch  war  of  1523,  declared  (not  com- 
plaining of  it,  but  merely  as  a  reason  why  he  should 
receive  support)  that  he  had  spent  all  his  private  means 
upon  the  army  ;  and  in  the  sequel  of  this  history  we 
shall  find  repeated  instances  of  knights  and  gentlemen 
voluntarily  ruining  themselves  in  the  service  of  their 
country.  The  people,  not  universally,  but  generally,  were 
animated  by  a  true  spirit  of  sacrifice  ;  by  a  true  convic- 
tion that  they  were  bound  to  think  first  of  England,  and 
only  next  of  themselves  ;  and  unless  we  can  bring  our- 
selves to  understand  this,  we  shall  never  understand 
wliat  England  was  under  the  reigns  of  the  Plantagenets 
and  Tudors.  The  expenses  of  the  court  under  Henry 
YII.  were  a  little  over  £11,000  a  year,  out  of  which 
were  defrayed  the  whole  cost  of  the  king's  establish- 
ment, the  expenses  of  entertaining  foreign  ambassadors, 
the  wages  and  maintenance  of  the  yeomen  of  the  guard, 
the  retinues  of  servants,  and  all  necessary  outlay  not 
incurred  for  public  business.     Under  Henry  VIII.,  of 


SIXTEEXTH    CENTURY    EXGLISHMEN",  163 

whose  extravagance  we  have  heard  so  much,  and  whose 
court  was  the  most  magnificent  in  the  world,  these 
expenses  were  £19,894  16s.  Sd.,  a  small  sum  when  com- 
pared with  the  present  cost  of  the  royal  establishment, 
even  if  we  adopt  the  relative  estimate  of  twelve  to  one, 
and  suppose  it  equal  to  £240,000  a  year  of  our  money. 
But  indeed  it  was  not  equal  to  £240,000  ;  for,  although 
the  proportion  held  in  articles  of  common  consumption, 
articles  of  luxury  were  very  dear  indeed. 
''•iPassing  down  from  the  king  and  his  nobles,  to  the 
body  of  the  people,  we  find  that  the  income  qualifying  a 
country  gentleman  to  be  justice  of  the  peace  was  £20  a 
year,  and  if  he  did  his  duty,  his  office  was  no  sinecure. 
"We  remember  Justice  Shallow  and  his  clerk  Davy,  with 
his  novel  theory  of  magisterial  law  ;  and  Shallow's  broad 
features  have-  so  English  a  cast  about  them  that  we  may 
believe  there  were  many  such,  and  that  the  duty  was  not 
always  very  excellently  done.  But  the  Justice  Shallows 
were  not  allowed  to  repose  upon  their  dignity.  The 
justice  of  the  peace  was  required  not  only  to  take 
cognizance  of  open  offences,  but  to  keep  surveillance 
over  all  persons  within  his  distrist,  and  over  himself  in 
his  own  turn  there  was  a  surveillance  no  less  sharp,  and 
penalties  for  neglect  prompt  and  peremptory.  Four 
times  a  year  he  was  to  make  proclamation  of  his  duty, 
and  exhort  all  persons  to  complain  against  him  who  had 
occasion. 

Twenty  pounds  a  year,  and  heavy  duties  to  do  for  it, 
represented  the  condition  uf  the  squire  of  the  parish. 
By  the  2d  of  the  2d  of  Henry  Y.,  "  the  wages"  of  a 
parish  priest  were  limited  to  £5  Gs.  8r/. ,  except  in  cases 
where  there  was  special  license  from  the  bishop,  when 
they  might  be  raised  as  high  as  £0.  Priests  were 
probably  soiuething  bettei'  oft'  under  Henry  VIII.,  but 


IG-i  SKETCHES    FllOM    J.    A.    FKUUBE. 

the  statute  remained  in  force,  and  marks  an  approach  at 
least  to  their  ordinary  salary.  The  priest  had  enough, 
being  unmarried,  to  supply  him  in  comfort  M'ith  the 
necessaries  of  life.  The  squire  had  enough  to  provide 
moderate  abundance  for  himself  and  his  family.  Neither 
priest  nor  sqnire  was  able  to  establish  any  steep  difference 
in  outward  advantages  between  himself  and  the  commons 
among  whom  he  lived. 

The  habits  of  all  classes  were  open,  free,  and  liberal. 
There  are  two  expressions  corresponding  one  to  the 
other,  which  we  frequently  meet  with  in  old  writings, 
and  which  are  used  as  a  kind  of  index,  marking  whether 
the  condition  of  things  was  or  was  not  what  it  ought  to 
be.  We  read  of  "merry  England" — when  England 
was  not  merry,  things  were  not  going  w^ell  with  it.  We 
hear  of  "the  glory  of  hospitality,"  England's  pre- 
eminent boast — by  the  rules  of  Avhich  all  tables,  from 
the  table  of  the  twenty-shilling  freeholder  to  the  table 
in  the  baron's  hall  and  abbey  refectory,  were  open  at  the 
dinner-hour  to  all  comers,  without  stint  or  reserve,  or 
question  asked  :  to  every  man  according  to  his  degree,  who 
chose  to  ask  for  it,  there  was  free  fare  and  free  lodging  ; 
bread,  beef,  and  beer  for  his  dinner  ;  for  his  lodging, 
perhaps,  only  a  mat  of  rushes  in  a  spare  corner  of  the 
hall,  with  a  billet  of  wood  for  a  pillow,  but  freely 
offered  and  freely  taken,  the  guest  probably  faring  much 
as  his  host  fared,  neither  worse  nor  better.  There  was 
little  fear  of  an  abuse  of  such  license,  for  suspicious 
characters  had  no  leave  to  wander  at  pleasure  ;  and  for 
any  man  found  at  large,  and  unable  to  give  a  sufficient 
account  of  himself,  there  were  the  ever-read}^  parish 
stocks  or  town  jail.  The  "  glory  of  hospitality"  lasted 
far  down  into  Elizabetirs  time  ;  and  then,  as  Camden 
says,  "  came  in  great  bravery  of  building,  to  the  mar- 


SIXTEENTH    CENTUUY    ENGLISHMEN.  165 

velJous  beautifying  of  tlie  realm,  but  to  the  dec-ay"'  of 
M'hat  he  vahied  more. 

In   such   frank    style  the   people   lived,    hatin*^  three 
things    with    all     their    hearts  :    idleness,     want,     and 

..  cowardice  ;  and  for  the  rest,  carrying  their  hearts  high, 
■  and  having  their  hands  full.     The  hour  of  rising,  winter 

;v*jand  summer,  was  four  o'clock,  with  breakfast  at  five, 
after  which  the  -  laborers  went  to  work,  and  the  gentle- 

/«ien  to  l)usiness,  of  which  they  had  no  little.     In  the 

^  Country  every  unknown  face  was  challenged  and  ex- 
amined—  if  the  account  given  was  insutficient,  he  was 
brought  before  the  justice  ;  if  the  village  sliopkeeper 

•  sold  bad  wares,  if  the  village  cobbler  made  "  unhonest'' 
/shoes,  if  servants  and  masters  quarrelled,  all  was  to  be 
looked  to  by  the  justice  ;  there  w^as  no  fear  lest  time 
should  hang  heavy  with  him.  At  twelve  he  dined  ; 
after  diimer  he  w^ent  hunting,  or  to  his  farm,  or  to  M'hat 
he  pleased.  It  was  a  life  unrefined,  perhaps,  but  colored 
with  a  lu'oad,  rosy,  English  health. 

Of  the  education  of  nol)lemen  and  gentlemen  we  have 
contradictory  accounts,  as  might  be  expected.  The 
universities  were  well  filled,  by  the  sons  of  yeomen 
chiefly.  The  cost  of  supporting  them  at  the  colleges 
was  little,  and  wealth}-  men  took  a  pride  in  helping 
forward  any  l)oys  of  promise.  It  seem?  clear  also,  as 
the  Refornuition  drew  nearer,  while  the  clere^v  were 
sinking  lower  and  lower,  a  marked  change  for  the  better 
became  perce|)tible  in  a  portion  at  least  of  the  laity.  The 
more  old-fashioned  of  the  higher  ranks  were  slow  in 
moving  ;  for  as  late  as  the  reign  of  Edward  VI.  there 
were  peers  of  parliament  unable  to  read  ;  but  on  the 
whole,  the  invention  of  printing,  and  the  general  ferinent 
which  was  commencing  all  over  the  world,  had  produced 
marked    effects    in    all    classes.       Henry    VI 11.    himself 


166  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FROUDE. 

spoke  four  Iniii^nages,  and  was  well  read  in  tlieology  and 
history  ;  and  the  high  aceomphshaients  of  More  and  Sir 
T.  Elhott,  of  Wyatt  and  Cromwell,  were  but  the  ex- 
treme expression  of  a  temper  wliich  was  rapidly  spread- 
ing, and  which  gave  occasion,  among  other  things,  to 
the  following  reflection  in  Erasmus:  "Oh,  strange 
vicissitudes  of  human  things,"  exclaims  he.  "  Here- 
tofore the  heart  of  learning  was  among  such  as  professed 
religion.  Now,  while  they  for  the  most  part  give  them- 
selves up,  veyitri  luxui pecunoceque,  the  love  of  learning 
is  gone  from  them  to  secular  princes,  the  court,  and  the 
nobility.  May  we  not  justly  be  ashamed  of  ourselves  ? 
The  feasts  of  priests  and  divines  are  drowned  in  wine, 
are  filled  with  scurrilous  jests,  sound  with  intemperate 
noise  and  tumult,  flow  with  spiteful  slanders  and  def- 
amation of  others  ;  while  at  princes'  tables  modest 
disputations  are  held  concerning  things  which  make  for 
learning  and  piety." 

A  letter  to  Thomas  Cromwell  from  his  son's  tutor 
will  not  be  without  interest  on  this  subject  ;  Cromwell 
was  likely  to  have  been  unusually  careful  in  his  chil- 
dren's training,  and  we  need  not  suppose  that  all  boys 
were  brought  up  as  prudently.  Sir  Peter  Carew,  for 
instance,  being  a  boy  at  about  the  same  time,  and  giving 
trouble  at  the  High  School  at  Exeter,  was  led  home  to 
his  father's  house  at  Ottery,  coupled  between  two  fox- 
hounds. Yet  the  education  of  Gregory  Cromwell  is 
probably  not  far  above  what  many  young  men  of  the 
middle  and  higher  ranks  were  beginning  to  receive. 
Henry  Dowes  was  the  tutor's  name,  beyond  which  fact 
1  know  nothing  of  him.      His  letter  is  as  follows  : 

"  After  that  it  pleased  your  mastership  to  give  me  in 
charge,  not  only  to  give  diligent  attendance  upon  Master 
Gregory,  but    also   to   instruct  him  with   good  letters, 


SIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  KiT 

honest  manners,  pastyme  of  instruments,  and  sucli  other 
qualities  as  sliould  be  for    him  meet   and  convenient, 
plcaseth  it  you  to  understand  that  for  the  accomplish- 
ment thereof   I  liave  endeavoured  myself  by  all   ways 
possible  to  excogitate  how  I  might  most  profit  him.     In 
..which  behalf,  through  his  diligence,  the  success  is  such 
.  ras  I  trust  shall  be  to  your  good  contentation  and  pleasure, 
'and  to  his  no  small  profit.     But  for  cause  the  summer 
,;svas  spent  in  the  service  of  the  wild  gods  [and]  it  is  so 
^  much    to    be    regarded   after   what    fashion    youth    is 
brought  up,  in  which  time  that  that  is  learned  for  the 
7Tiost  part  will  not  be  wholly  forgotten   in    the   older 
years,  I  think  it  my  duty  to  ascertain  your  mastership 
*'  ^low   he  spendetli  his  time.     And  first   after  he   hath 
'  heard  mass  he  taketh  a  lecture  of  a  dialogue  of  Erasmus' 
'  Colloquies,'   called    Pietas   PueriUs,   wherein   is   de- 
scribed a  very  picture  of  one  that  should  be  virtuously 
brought  up  ;  and  for  cause  it  is  so  necessary  for  him,  I 
do  not  only  cause  him  to  read  it  over,  but  also  to  prac- 
tise the  precepts  of  the  same.     After  this  he  exerciseth 
his  hand  in  writing  one  or  two  hours,  and  readeth  upon 
Fabyan's  '  Chronicle'  as  long.     The  residue  of  the  day 
he  doth  spend  upon  the  lute  and  virginals.     When  he 
rideth,  as  he  doth  very  oft,  I  tell  him  by  the  way  some 
history  of  the  Romans  or  the  Greeks,  which  I   cause 
him  to  rehearse  again  in  a  tale.     For  his  recreation  he 
useth  to  hawk  and  himt  and  shoot  in  his  long  bow,  which 
frameth  and  succeedeth  so  well  with  him  that  he  seemeth 
to  be  thereunto  given  by  nature." 

I  have  spoken  of  the  organization  of  the  country 
population,  I  have  now  to  speak  of  that  of  the  towns,  of 
the  trading  classes  and  manufacturing  classes,  the  regula- 
tions respecting  which  arc  no  less  remarkable  and  no  less 
illustrative  of  the  national  character.     Jf  the  tcndeucj; 


108  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FUOUDE. 

of  trade  to  assume  at  last  a  form  of  mere  self-interest  be 
irresistible,  if  political  economy  represent  the  laws  to 
wliicli  in  the  end  it  is  forced  to  submit  itself,  the  nation 
spared  no  efforts,  either  of  art  or  policy,  to  defer  to  the 
last  mom&nt  the  unwelcome  conclusion. 

The  names  and  shadows  linger  about  London  of 
certain  ancient  societies,  the  members  of  which  may  still 
occasionally  be  seen  in  quaint  gilt  barges  pursuing  their 
own  difficult  way  among  the  swarming  steamers  ;  when 
on  certain  days,  the  traditions  concerning  w^hich  are  fast 
dying  out  of  memory,  the  Fishmongers'  Company,  the 
Goldsmiths'  Company,  the  Mercers'  Company,  make 
procession  down  the  riv^er  for  civic  f eastings  at  Green- 
wich or  Blackwall.  The  stately  tokens  of  ancient  honor 
still  belong  to  them,  and  the  remnants  of  ancient  wealth 
and  patronage  and  power.  Their  charters  may  be  read 
by  curious  antiquaries,  and  the  bills  of  fare  of  their 
ancient  entertainments.  But  for  what  purpose  they 
were  called  into  being,  what  there  was  in  these  associa- 
tions of  common  trades  to  surround  with  gilded  insignia, 
and  how  they  came  to  be  possessed  of  broad  lands  and 
church  preferments,  few  people  now  care  to  think  or  to 
inquire.  Trade  and  traders  have  no  dignity  any  more 
in  the  eyes  of  any  one,  except  what  money  lends  to 
them  ;  and  these  outward  symbols  scarcely  rouse  even  a 
passing  feeling  of  curiosity.  And  yet  these  companies 
were  once  something  more  than  names.  They  are  all 
which  now  remain  of  a  vast  organization  which  once 
penetidted  the  entire  trading  life  of  England — an  organ- 
ization set  on  foot  to  realize  that  most  necessary,  if 
most  difficult,  condition  of  commercial  excellence  under 
which  man  should  deal  faithfully  with  his  brother,  and 
all  wares  offered  for  sale,  of  whatever  kind,  should 
honestly  be  what  they  pretend  to  be.     I  spoke  of  the 


vSIXTEENTH    CENTURY    ENGLISHMEN.  lt)9 

military  principle  which  directed  the  distribution  ami 
the  arranjj-ements  of  land.  The  aiialoo;v  will  best  ex- 
plain  a  state  of  things  in  which  every  occupation  was 
treated  as  the  division  of  an  army  ;  regiments  being 
quartered  in  every  town,  each  with  its  own  self-elected 
officers,  whose  duty  was  to  exercise  authority  over  all 
*|)ersons  professing  the  business  to  which  they  belonged  ; 
who  were  to  see  that  no  person  undertook  to  supply 
articles  which  he  had  not  been  educated  to  manufacture  ; 
,who  were  to  determine  the  prices  at  which  such  articles 
ought  justly  to  be  sold  ;  above  all,  who  were  to  take  care 
that  the  common  people  really  bought  at  shops  and  stalls 
wliat  they  supposed  themselves  to  be  buying  ;  that  cloth 
put  up  for  sale  was  true  cloth,  of  true  texture  and  full 
weight  ;  that  leather  was  sound  and  well  tanned  ;  wine 
pure,  measures  honest  ;  flour  unmixed  with  devil's  dust 
— who  were  generally  to  look  to  it  that  in  all  contracts 
between  man  and  man  for  the  supply  of  man's  neces- 
sities, what  we  call  honesty  of  dealing  should  be  truly 
and  faithfully  observed.  An  organization  for  this  pur- 
pose did  once  really  exist  in  England,  really  trying  to  do 
the  work  which  it  was  intended  to  do,  as  half  the  pages  of 
our  early  statutes  witness.  In  London,  as  the  metropolis, 
a  central  council  sate  for  every  branch  of  trade,  and  this 
council  was  in  communication  with  the  Chancellor  and 
the  Crown.  It  was  composed  of  the  highest  and  most 
respectaljle  members  of  the  profession,  and  its  office  was 
to  determine  prices,  fix  wages,  arrange  the  rules  of 
apprenticeship,  and  discuss  all  details  connected  with  the 
business  on  which  legislation  might  be  rec^uired.  Fur- 
ther, this  council  received  the  reports  of  the  searchers — 
high  officers  taken  from  their  own  body,  whose  business 
was  to  inspect,  in  company  with  the  lord  mayor  or  some 
other  city  dignitary,  the  shops  of  the  respective  traders  ; 


170  SKETCHES    FKOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

to  receive  complaints,  and  to  examine  into  them.  In  each 
provincial  town  local  councils  sate  in  connection  with  the 
municipal  authorities,  who  fulfilled  in  these  places  the 
same  duties  ;  and  their  reports  being  forwarded  to  the 
central  body,  and  considered  by  them,  representations 
on  all  necessary  matters  were  then  made  to  the  privy 
council  ;  and  by  the  privy  council,  if  requisite,  were 
submitted  to  parliament.  If  these  representations  were 
judged  to  require  legislative  interference,  the  statutes 
which  were  passed  in  consequence  were  returned  through 
the  Chancellor  to  the  mayors  of  the  various  towns  and 
cities,  by  whom  they  were  proclaimed  as  law.  No 
person  was  allowed  to  open  a  trade  or  to  commence  a 
manufacture,  either  in  London  or  the  provinces,  unless 
he  had  first  served  his  apprenticeship  ;  unless  he  could 
prove  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  authorities  that  he  was 
competent  in  his  craft  ;  and  unless  he  submitted  as  a 
matter  of  course  to  their  supervision.  The  legislature 
had  undertaken  not  to  let  that  indispensable  task  go 
wholly  unattempted,  of  distributing  the  various  func- 
tions of  society  by  the  rule  of  capacity  ;  of  compelling 
every  man  to  do  his  duty  in  an  honest  following  of  his 
proper  calling,  securing  to  him  that  he  in  his  turn  should 
not  be  injured  by  his  neighbor's  misdoings. 

The  state  further  promising  for  itself  that  all  able- 
bodied  men  should  be  found  in  work,  and  not  allowing 
any  man  to  work  at  a  l)usiness  for  which  he  was  unfit, 
insisted  as  its  natural  light  that  children  should  not  be 
allowed  to  grow  up  in  idleness,  to  be  returned  at  mature 
age  upon  its  hands.  Every  child,  so  far  as  possible,  was 
to  be  trained  up  in  some  business  or  calling,  idleness 
"  being  the  mother  of  all  sin,"  and  the  essential  duty  of 
every  man  being  to  provide  honestly  for  himself  and  his 
family.     The  educative   theory,   for   such   it   was,   was 


SIXTEEXTir    CEXTLRV    ENGLISHMEN.  171 

simple  but  effective  :  it  was  based  on  the  single  principle 
that,  next  to  the  knowledge  of  a  man's  duty  to  God, 
and  as  a  means  toward  doing  that  duty,  the  lirst  condi- 
tion of  a  worthy  life  was  the  ability  to  maintain  it  in 
independence.  Yarieties  of  inapplicable  knowledge 
might  be  good,  but  they  were  not  essential  ;  such 
.Ivjiowledge  might  be  left  to  the  leisure  of  after-years, 
or  it  might  be  dispensed  with  without  vital  injury. 
A-bility  to  labor  could  not  be  dispensed  with,  and  this, 
therefore,  the  state  felt  it  to  be  its  own  duty  to  see 
provided  ;  so  reaching,  I  cannot  but  think,  the  heart  of 
the  whole  matter.  The  children  of  those  who  could 
afford  the  small  entrance  fees  were  appi*enticed  to  trades, 
t]4e  rest  were  apprenticed  to  agriculture  ;  and  if  children 
were  found  growing  up  idle,  and  their  fathers  or  their 
friends  failed  to  prove  that  they  were  able  to  secure 
them  an  ultimate  maintenance,  the  mayors  in  towns  and 
the  magistrates  in  the  country  had  authority  to  take 
possession  of  such  children,  and  aj^prentice  them  as  they 
saw  fit,  that  when  they  grew  up  "they  might  not  be 
driven"  by  want  or  incapacity  "  to  dishonest  courses," 

In  the  brief  review  of  the  system  under  which  England 
was  governed,  we  have  seen  a  state  of  things  in  which 
the  principles  of  political  economy  were,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  contradicted  ;  where  an  attempt,  more  or 
less  successful,  w^as  made  to  bring  the  production  and 
distribution  of  wealth  under  the  moral  rule  of  right  and 
wrong  ;  and  where  those  laws  of  supply  and  demand, 
which  we  are  now  taught  to  regard  as  immutable  ordi- 
nances of  nature,  were  absorbed  or  superseded  by  a 
higher  code.  It  is  necessary  for  me  to  repeat  that  I  am 
not  holding  up  the  sixteenth  century  as  a  model  which 
the  nineteenth  might  safely  follow.  The  population  has 
become  too  large,   employment   has   become  too  com- 


17-2  SKETCHF.S    FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

plicated  and  fluctuating,  to  admit  of  external  control  ; 
Avliile,  in  default  of  control,  the  relapse  upon  self-interest 
as  the  one  motive  principle  is  certain  to  ensue,  and  when 
it  ensues  is  absolute  in  its  operations.  But  as,  even  with 
us,  these  so-called  ordinances  of  nature  in  time  of  war 
consent  to  be  suspended,  and  duty  to  his  country  be- 
comes with  every  good  citizen  a  higher  motive  of  action 
than  the  advantages  which  he  may  gain  in  an  enemy's 
market,  so  it  is  not  uncheering  to  look  back  upon  a  time 
when  the  nation  was  in  a  normal  condition  of  militancy 
against  social  injustice — when  the  government  was 
enabled  by  happy  circumstances  to  pursue  into  detail  a 
single  and  serious  aim  at  the  well-being — ^well-being  in 
its  widest  sense — of  all  members  of  the  commonwealth. 
The  world,  indeed,  was  not  made  particularly  pleasant. 
Of  liberty,  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word,  of  the 
supposed  right  of  every  man  "to  do  what  he  wdll  with 
his  own"  or  with  himself,  there  was  no  idea.  To  the 
question,  if  ever  it  was  asked,  May  I  not  do  what  I  will 
with  my  own  ?  there  was  the  brief  answer,  No  man  may 
do  what  is  wrong,  either  with  that  which  is  his  own 
or  with  that  which  is  another's.  Workmen  were  not 
allowed  to  take  advantage  of  the  scantiness  of  the  labor 
market  to  exact  extravagant  wages.  Capitalists  were  not 
allowed  to  drive  the  laborers  from  their  holdings,  and 
destroy  their  healthy  independence.  The  antagonism  of 
interests  was  absorbed  into  a  relation  of  which  equity 
was  something  more  than  the  theoretic  principle,  and 
employers  and  employed  were  alike  amenable  to  a  law 
which  both  were  compelled  to  obey.  The  workingman 
of  modern  times  has  bought  the  extension  of  his  liberty 
at  the  price  of  his  material  comfort.  The  higher  classes 
have  gained  in  luxury  what  they  have  lost  in  power.  It 
is  not  for  the  historian  to  balance  advantages.  His  duty 
.is  with  the  facts. 


.:'^RE   CORONATION    OF   ANNE   BOLEYN.* 

Queen   Anne  was   at    Greenwich,   but   according  to 
(Mistom,  the  few  precedino;  days  were  to  be  spent  at  the 
Tower  ;  and  on  the  19th  of  May  she  was   conducted 
thither  in   state  by  tr.e  lord   mayor  and  the  city  com- 
panies, with  one  of  tliose  splendid  exhibitions  npon  the 
water  which  in  the  days  when  the   silver  Thames  de- 
served its  name,  and  the  sun  could  shine  down  upon  it 
out  of   the  Que  summer  sky,  were  spectacles  scarcely 
rivalled  in  gorgeoiisness  by  the  world-famous  wedding  of 
the  Adriatic.     The  river  was  crowded  with  boats  ;  the 
banks  and  tlie  ships  in  the  pool  swarmed  with  people  ; 
and  Hfty  great  barges  formed  the  procession,  all  blazing 
with  gold  and  banners.     The  queen  herself  was  in  her 
own  barge,  close  to  that  of   the  lord  mayor  ;  and,  in 
keeping  with  the  fantastic  genius  of  the  time,  she  was 
preceded  up  the  water  b j  a  "  foyst  or  wafter  full  of  ord- 
nance, in  M'hich  was  a  great  dragon  continually  moving 
and  casting  wildfire,  and  round  about  the  foyst  stood 
terrible  monsters  and  wild  men,  casting  fire  and  making 
hideous    noise.''     So,    with    trumpets  blo^^^ng,    cannon 
pealing,    the   Tower   guns    answering    the  guns    of   the 
ships,  in  a  bhize  of  fireworks  and  splendor,  Anne  l>olcyn 
was  borne  along  to  the    great  archway  of  the  Tower, 
where  the  king  was  wvaiting  on  the  stairs  to  receive  her. 

*■  From  ••  History  of  iMiglaiul." 


n4  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

And  now  let  us  suppose  eleven  days  to  have  elapsed, 
the  welcome  news  to  have  arrived  at  length  from 
Dunstable,  and  the  fair  summer  morning  of  life  dawning 
in  treacherous  beauty  after  the  long  night  of  expecta- 
tion. No  bridal  ceremo)iial  had  been  possible  ;  the 
marriage  had  been  huddled  over  hke  a  stolen  love-match, 
and  the  marriage  feast  had  been  eaten  in  vexation  and 
disappointment.  These  past  mortifications  were  to  be 
atoned  for  by  a  coronation  pageant  which  the  art  and 
the  w-ealth  of  the  richest  city  in  Europe  should  be  poured 
out  in  the  most  lavish  profusion  to  adorn.  • 

On  the  morning  of  the  31st  of  May,  the  families  of 
the  London  citizens  were  stirring  early  in  all  houses. 
From  Temple  Bar  to  the  Tower,  the  streets  were  fresh 
strewed  with  gravel,  the  footpaths  were  railed  oif  along 
the  whole  distance,  and  occupied  on  one  side  by  the 
guilds,  their  workmen,  and  apprentices,  on  the  other  by 
the  city  constables  and  officials  in  their  gaudy  uniforms, 
"  with  their  staves  in  hand  for  to  cause  the  people  to 
keep  good  room  and  order,"  Cornhill  and  Graceclmrch 
Street  had  dressed  their  fronts  in  scarlet  and  crimson,  in 
arras  and  tapestry,  and  the  rich  carpet-work  from  Persia 
and  the  East.  Cheapside,  to  outshine  her  rivals,  was 
draped  even  more  splendidly  in  cloth  of  gold,  and  tissue, 
and  velvet.  The  sheriffs  were  pacing  uj)  and  down  on 
their  great  Flemish  horses,  hung  with  liveries,  and  all 
the  windows  were  thronged  with  ladies  crowding  to 
see  the  procession  pass.  At  length  the  Tower  guns 
opened,  the  grim  gates  rolled  back,  and  under  the  arch- 
w^ay  in  the  bright  May  sunshine,  the  long  column  began 
slowly  to  defile.  Two  states  only  permitted  their  repre- 
sentatives to  grace  the  scene  with  their  presence — Yenice 
and  France.  It  was,  perhaps,  to  make  the  most  of  this 
isolated  countenance,  that  the  French  ambassador's  train 


THE    COROXATIO:S'    OF    ANNE    BOLETN.  175 

formed  the  van  of  the  cavalcade.  Twelve  French 
knights  came  riding  foremost  in  siircoats  of  blue  velvet 
■with  sleeves  of  yellow  silk,  their  horses  trapped  in  blue, 
with  white  crosses  powdered  on  their  hangings.  After 
them  followed  a  troop  of  English  gentlemen,  two  and 
two,  and  then  the  Knights  of  the  Bath,  "in  gowns  of 
violet,  with  hoods  purfled  with  miniver  like  doctors." 
Ne^t,  perhaps  at  a  little  interval,  the  abbots  passed  on, 
mitred  in  their  robes  ;  the  barons  followed  in  crimson 
velvet,  the  bishops  then,  and  then  the  earls  and  mar- 
quises, the  dresses  of  each  order  increasing  in  elaborate 
gorgeousness.  All  these  rode  on  in  pairs.  Then  came 
alone  Audeley,  lord  chancellor,  and  behind  him  the 
Venetian  ambassador  and  the  Archbishop  of  York  ;  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  Du  Bellay,  Bishop  of 
Bayonne  and  «f  Paris,  not  now  with  bugle  and  hunting- 
frock,  but  solemn  with  stole  and  crosier.  Next,  the 
lord  mayor,  with  the  city  mace  in  hand,  and  Garter  in 
his  coat  of  arms  ;  and  then  Lord  William  Howard  — 
Belted  "Will  Howard,  of  the  Scottish  Border,  Marshal  of 
England.  The  officers  of  the  queen's  household  suc- 
ceeded the  marshal  in  scarlet  and  gold,  and  the  van  of 
the  procession  was  closed  by  the  Duke  of  Suffolk,  as 
high  constable,  with  his  silver  wand.  It  is  no  easy 
matter  to  picture  to  ourselves  the  blazing  trail  of  splen- 
dor which  in  such  a  pageant  must  have  drawn  along  the 
London  streets — those  streets  which  now  we  know  so 
black  and  smoke-grimed,  themselves  then  radiant  with 
masses  of  color,  gold,  and  crimson,  and  violet.  Yet 
there  it  was,  and  there  the  sun  could  shine  upon  it,  and 
tens  of  thousands  of  eyes  were  gazing  on  the  scene  out 
of  the  crowded  lattices. 

Glorious   as  the  spectacle   was,    perhaps    however,    it 
passed    unhcedod.      Those    eyes    were   watching   all   for 


17G  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.    FKOUOE. 

another  object,  wliicli  now  drew  near.  In  an  open 
space  beliind  the  constable  tliere  was  seen  approaching 
"a  w^hite  chariot,"  dawn  by  two  palfreys  in  white 
damask  which  swept  the  ground,  a  golden  canopy  borne 
above  it  making  music  with  silver  bells  :  and  in  the 
chariot  sat  the  observed  of  all  observers,  the  beautiful 
occasion  of  all  this  glittering  homage  ;  fortune's  play- 
thing of  the  hour,  the  Queen  of  England — queen  at  last — 
borne  along  upon  the  waves  of  this  sea  of  glory,  breath- 
ing the  perfumed  incense  of  greatness  which  she  had 
risked  her  fair  name,  her  delicacy,  her  honor,  her  self- 
respect,  to  win  ;  and  she  had  won  it. 

There  she  sate,  dressed  in  white  tissue  robes,  her  fair 
hair  flowing  loose  over  her  shoulders,  and  her  temples 
circled  with  a  light  coronet  of  gold  and  diamonds — most 
beautiful — loveliest  —  most  favored  perhaps,  as  she 
seeihed  at  that  hour,  of  all  England's  daughters.  Alas  ! 
"  within  the  hollow  round  "  of  that  coronet  — 

"  Kept  death  his  court,  unci  there  the  antick  sate 
Scoffing  her  state  and  grinning  at  her  pomp. 
Allowing  her  a  little  breath,  a  little  scene 
To  monarchize,  he  feared,  and  kill  with  looks, 
Infusing  her  with  self  and  vain  conceit, 
As  if  the  flesh  winch  walled  about  her  life 
Were  brass  impregnable  ;  and  humored  thus. 
Bored  through  her  castle  walls  ;  and  farewell,  Queen." 

Fatal  gift  of  greatness  !  so  dangerous  ever  !  so  more 
than  dangerous  in  those  tremendous  times  when  the 
fountains  are  broken  loose  of  the  great  deeps  of 
thought  ;  and  nations  are  in  the  throes  of  revolution — 
when  ancient  order  and  law  and  tradition  are  splitting  in 
the  social  earthquake  ;  and  as  the  opposing  forces  wrestle 
to  and  fro,  those  unhappy  ones  who  stand  out  above  the 
crowd  become  the  symbols  of  the  struggle,  and  fall  the 


THE    CORONATION    OF    ANNE    BOLEYN.  177 

victims  of  its  alternating  fortunes.  And  what  if  into  an 
unsteady  heart  and  brain,  intoxicated  with  splendor,  the 
outward  chaos  should  find  its  way,  converting  the  poor 
silly  soul  into  an  image  of  the  same  confusion — if  con- 
science should  be  deposed  from  her  high  place,  and  the 
Pandora  box  be  broken  loose  of  passions  and  sensualities 
and  follies  ;  and  at  length  there  be  nothing  left  of  all 
which  man  orwoiuan  ought  to  value,  save  hope  of  God's 
forgiveness  ? 

Three  short  years  have  yet  to  pass,  and  again,  on  a 
summer  morning.  Queen  Anne  Boleyn  will  leave  the 
Tower  of  London — not  radiant  then  with  beauty  on  a 
gay  errand  of  coronation,  but  a  poor  wandering  ghost, 
on  a  sad  tragic  errand,  from  which  she  will  never  more 
return,  passing  away  out  of  an  earth  where  she  may  stay 
no  longer,  into  a  presence  where,  nevertheless,  we  know 
that  all  is  well — for  all  of  us — and  therefore  for  her. 

But  let  us  not  cloud  her  short-lived  sunshine  with  the 
shadow  of  the  future.  She  went  on  in  her  loveliness, 
the  peeresses  following  in  their  carriages,  with  the  royal 
guard  in  their  rear.  In  Fenchurch  Street  she  was  met 
by  the  children  of  the  city  schools  ;  and  at  the  corner  of 
Gracechurch  Street  a  masterpiece  had  been  prepared  of 
the  pseudo- classic  art,  then  so  fashionable,  by  the  mer- 
chants of  the  Styllyard.  A  Mount  Parnassus  had  been 
constructed,  and  a  Helicon  fountain  upon  it  playing  into 
a  basin  with  four  jets  of  Rhenisli  wine.  On  the  top  of 
the  mountain  sat  Apollo  with  Calliope  at  his  feet,  and 
on  either  side  the  remaining  Muses,  holding  lutes  or 
harps,  and  singing  each  of  them  some  "  posy"  or 
epigram  in  praise  of  the  queen,  which  was  presented, 
after  it  had  been  sung,  written  in  letters  of  gold. 

From  Gracechurch  Street  the  procession  passed  to 
Leadenhall,  where  there  was  a  spectacle  in  l)etter  taste. 


178  SKETCHES    FROM    J,   A.   FROUDE. 

of  the  old  English  Catholic  kind,  quaint  perhaps  and 
forced,  but  truly  and  even  beautifully  emblematic. 
There  was  again  a  "little  mountain,"  which  was  hung 
with  red  and  white  roses  ;  a  gold  ring  was  placed  on 
the  summit,  on  which,  as  the  queen  appeared,  a  white 
falcon  was  made  to  "  descend  as  out  of  the  sky,"  "  and 
then  incontinent  came  down  an  angel  with  great  melody, 
and  set  a  close  crown  of  gold  upon  the  falcon's  head  ; 
and  in  the  same  pageant  sat  Saint  Anne  with  all  her 
issue  beneath  her  ;  and  Mary  Cleophas  with  her  four 
children,  of  the  which  children  one  made  a  goodly 
oration  to  the  queen,  of  the  fruitfulness  of  St.  Anne, 
trusting  that  like  fruit  should  come  of  her." 

With  such  "  pretty  conceits,"  at  that  time  the  honest 
tokens  of  an  English  welcome,  the  new  queen  was 
received  by  the  citizens  of  London.  These  scenes  must 
be  multiplied  by  the  number  of  the  streets,  where  some 
fresh  fancy  met  her  at  every  turn.  To  preserve  the 
festivities  from  flagging,  every  fountain  and  conduit 
within  the  walls  ran  all  day  with  wine  ;  the  bells  of 
every  steeple  were  ringing  ;  children  lay  in  wait  with 
songs,  and  ladies  with  posies,  in  which  all  the  resources 
of  fantastic  extravagance  were  exhausted  ;  and  thus  in 
an  unbroken  triumph — and  to  outward  appearance  re- 
ceived with  the  warmest  affection — she  passed  under 
Temple  Bar,  down  the  Strand  by  Charing  Cross,  to 
Westminster  Hall.  The  king  was  not  with  her  through- 
out the  day  ;  nor  did  he  intend  to  be  with  her  in  any 
part  of  the  ceremony.  She  was  to  reign  without  a  rival, 
the  undisputed  sovereign  of  the  hour. 

Saturday  being  passed  in  showing  herself  to  the 
people,  she  retired  for  the  night  to  "  the  king's  manor 
house  at  Westminster,"  where  she  slept.  On  the  fol- 
lowing  morning,    between   ei^ht   and   nine   o'clock,  she 


THE    COKOXATIOX    OF    AXXE    BOLEYN".  179 

returned  to  the  haU,  where  the  lord  mayor,  the  city 
council,  and  the  peers  were  again  assembled,  and  took 
her  place  on  the  high  dais  at  the  top  of  the  stairs  under 
the  cloth  of  state  ;  while  the  bishops,  the  abbots,  and 
the  monks  of  the  abbey  formed  in  the  area.  A  railed  way 
had  been  laid  with  carpets  across  Palace  Yard  and  the 
iSanctuary  to  the  abbey  gates,  and  when  all  was  ready, 
preceded  by  the  peers  in  their  robes  of  parliament,  the 
Knights  of  the  Garter  in  the  dress  of  the  order,  she 
swept  out  under  her  canopy,  the  bishops  and  the  monks 
"  solemnly  singing. "  The  train  was  borne  by  the  old 
Duchess  of  Norfolk  her  aunt,  the  Bishops  of  London 
and  Winchester  on  either  side  "  bearing  up  the  lappets 
of  her  robe."  The  Earl  of  Oxford  carried  the  crown 
on  its  cushiop  immediately  before  her.  She  was  dressed 
in  purple  velvet  furred  with  ermine,  her  hair  escaping 
loose,  as  she  usually  wore  it,  under  a  wreath  of  diamonds. 

On  entering  the  abbey,  she  was  led  to  the  coronation 
chair,  where  she  sat  while  the  train  fell  into  their  places, 
and  the  preliminaries  of  the  ceremonial  were  despatched. 
Then  she  was  conducted  up  to  the  high  altar,  and 
anointed  Queen  of  England,  and  she  received  from  the 
hands  of  Cranmer,  fresh  come  in  haste  from  Dunstable, 
with  the  last  words  of  his  sentence  upon  Catherine 
scarcely  silent  upon  his  lips,  the  golden  sceptre,  and  St. 
Edward's  crown. 

Did  any  twinge  of  remorse,  any  pang  of  painful 
recollection,  pierce  at  that  moment  the  incense  of  glory 
which  she  was  inhaling  ?  Did  any  vision  flit  across  her 
of  a  sad  mourning  figure  which  once  had  stood  where 
she  was  standing,  now  desolate,  neglected,  sinking  into 
the  darkening  twilight  of  a  life  cut  short  by  sorrow  ? 
Who  can  tell  ?  At  such  a  time,  that  figui'c  would  have 
weighed  heavily   upon  a  noble   mind,  and  a  wise  mind 


180  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

would  liave  been  taught  by  the  thought  of  it,  that, 
although  life  be  fleeting  as  a  dream,  it  is  long  enough  to 
experience  strange  vicissitudes  of  fortune.  But  Anne 
Boleyn  was  not  noble  and  was  not  wise — too  probably 
she  felt  nothing  but  the  delicious,  all-absorbing,  all- 
intoxicating  present  ;  and  if  that  plain,  suffering  face 
presented  itself  to  her  memory  at  all,  we  may  fear  that 
it  was  rather  as  a  foil  to  her  own  surpassing  loveliness. 
Two  years  later  she  was  able  to  exult  over  Catherine's 
death  ;  she  is  not  likely  to  have  thought  of  her  with 
gentler  feelings  in  the  lirst  glow  and  flush  of  triumph. 


VI. 

^?.  JOHN  BUN Y AN.* 

^^  He  was  happy  in  his  family.  His  blind  child,  for 
whom  he  had  been  so  touchingly  anxious,  had  died  while 
he  was  in  prison.  His  other  children  lived  atid  did 
well  ;  and  his  brave  companion,  who  had  spoken  so 
stoutly  for  him  to  the  judges,  continued  at  his  side. 
His  health,  it  was  said,  had  suffered  from  his  confine- 
ment ;  bu^the  only  serious  illness  which  we  hear  of  was 
an  attack  of  "  sweating  sickness,"  which  came  upon 
him  in  1687,  and  from  which  he  never  thoroughly  re- 
covered He  was  then  fifty-nine,  and  in  the  next  year 
he  died. 

His  end  was  characteristic.  It  was  brought  on  by  ex- 
posure when  he  was  engaged  in  an  act  of  charity.  A 
quarrel  had  broken  out  in  a  family  at  Reading  with 
which  Bunyan  had  some  acquaintance.  A  father  had 
taken  offence  at  his  son,  and  threatened  to  disinherit 
him.  Bunyan  undertook  a  journey  on  horseback  from 
Bedford  to  Reading  in  the  hope  of  reconciling  them. 
Pie  succeeded,  but  at  the  cost  of  his  life.  Returning  by 
London,  he  was  overtaken  on  the  road  by  a  storm  of 
rain,  and  was  wetted  through  before  he  could  find 
shelter.  The  chill,  falling  on  a  constitution  already 
weakened  by  illness,  brought  on  fever.     lie  was  able  to 

*  Part  of  the  last  cliaptcr  of  "  Julm  Bunyan,"  in  the  series  of 
"  Englisli  Men  of  Letters." 


183  SKETCHES    FROM   J.    A.   FROTTDE. 

reach  the  liouse  of  Mr.  Strudwick,  one  of  his  London 
friends  ;  but  lie  never  left  his  bed  afterward.  In  ten 
days  he  was  dead.  The  exact  date  is  uncertain.  It  was 
toward  the  end  of  August,  1688,  between  two  and  three 
months  before  the  landing  of  King  William.  He  was 
buried  in  Mr.  Strudwick's  vault,  in  the  Dissenters' 
burying-ground  at  Bunhill  Fields.  His  last  words  were, 
"  Take  me,  for  I  come  to  Thee." 

So  ended,  at  the  age  of  sixty,  a  man  who,  if  his  im- 
portance may  be  measured  by  the  influence  which  he 
has  exerted  over  succeeding  generations,  must  be 
counted  among  the  most  extraordinary  persons  whom 
England  has  j^roduced.  It  has  been  the  fashion  to  dwell 
on  the  disadvantages  of  his  education,  and  to  regret  the 
carelessness  of  nature  which  brought  into  existence  a  man 
of  genius  in  a  tinker's  hut  at  Elstow.  Xature  is  less 
partial  than  she  appears,  and  all  situations  in  life  have 
their  compensations  along  with  them. 

Circumstances,  I  should  say,  qualified  Bunyan  per- 
fectly Avell  for  the  work  which  he  had  to  do.  If  he  had 
gone  to  school,  as  he  said,  with  Aristotle  and  Plato  ;  if 
he  had  been  broken  in  at  a  university  and  been  turned 
into  a  bishop  ;  if  he  had  been  in  any  one  of  the  learned 
professions,  he  might  easily  have  lost,  or  might  have 
never  known,  the  secret  of  his  powers.  He  was  born  to 
he  the  Poet-apostle  of  the  English  middle  classes,  im- 
perfectly educated  like  himself  ;  and,  being  one  of 
themselves,  he  had  the  key  of  their  thoughts  and  feel- 
ings in  hi  s  own  heart.  Like  nine  out  of  ten  of  his 
countrymen,  lie  came  into  the  world  with  no  fortune 
but  his  industry.  He  had  to  work  with  his  hands  for 
his  bread,  and  to  advance  by  the  side  of  his  neighbors 
along  the  road  of  common  business.  His  knowledge 
was  scanty,  though  of  rare  quality.     He  knew  his  Bible 


JOHX    BUXYAN.  183 

probably  by  heart.  He  had  studied  history  in  Foxe'.s 
' '  Martyrs, ' '  but  nowhere  else  that  we  can  trace.  The  rest 
of  his  mental  furniture  was  gathered  at  first  hand  from  his 
conscience,  his  life,  and  his  occupations.  Thus,  every 
idea  which  he  received  falling  into  a  soil  naturally  fertile, 
sprouted  up  fresh,  vigorous,  and  original.  He  confessed 
";to  have  felt  (as  a  man  of  his  powers  could  hardly  have 
failed  to  feel)  continued  doubts  about  the  Bible  and  the 
•reality  of  the  Divine  government.  It  has  been  well  said 
'that  w^hen  we  look  into  the  world  to  find  the  image  of 
God,  it  is  as  if  we  were  to  stand  before  a  looking-glass, 
expecting  to  see  ourselves  reflected  there,  and  to  see 
nothing.  Education  scarcely  improves  our  perception 
/in  this  respect  ;  and  wider  information,  wider  acquaint- 
ance with  the  thoughts  of  other  men  in  other  ages  and 
countries,  might  as  easily  have  increased  his  difficulties 
as  have  assisted  him  in  overcoming  them.  He  was  not 
a  man  who  could  have  contented  himself  with  compro- 
mises and  half-convictions.  No  force  could  have  sub- 
dued him  into  a  decent  Anglican  divine — a  "  Mr.  Two 
Tongues,  parson  of  the  parish."  He  was  passionate  and 
thorough -going.  The  authority  of  conscience  presented 
itself  to  him  only  in  the  shape  of  religious  obligation. 
Religion  once  shaken  into  a  "  perhaps,"  would  have  had 
no  existence  to  him  ;  and  it  is  easy  to  conceive  a  uni- 
versity-bred Bunyan,  an  intellectual  meteor,  flaring 
uselessly  across  the  sky  and  disappearing  in  smoke  and 
nothingness. 

Powerful  temperaments  are  necessarily  intense. 
Bunyan,  Ixirn  a  tinker,  had  heard  right  and  wrong 
preached  to  him  in  the  name  of  the  Christian  creed.  He 
concluded  after  a  struggle  that  Christianity  was  true, 
and  on  that  conviction  he  built  himself  up  into  what  he 
was.     It  might  have  been  the  same,  perhaps,  with  Burns 


184         -  SKETCHES   FKOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

had  lie  been  born  a  century  before.  Given  Christianity 
as  an  unquestionably  true  account  of  the  situation  and 
future  prospects  of  man,  the  feature  of  it  most  appalling 
to  the  imagination  is  that  hell-fire— a  torment  exceeding 
the  most  horrible  which  fancy  can  conceive,  and  extend- 
ing into  eternity— awaits  the  enormous  majority  of  the 
human  race.  The  dreadful  probability  seized  hold  on 
the  young  Bunyan's  mind.  lie  shuddered  at  it  when 
awake.  In  the  visions  of  the  night  it  came  before  him 
in  the  tremendous  details  of  the  dreadful  reality.  It 
became  the  governing  thought  in  his  nature. 

Such  a  belief,  if  it  does  not  drive  a  man  to  madness, 
will  at  least  cure  him  of  trifling.  It  will  clear  his  mind 
of  false  sentiment,  take  the  nonsense  out  of  him,  and 
enable  him  to  resist  vulgar  temptation  as  nothing  else 
will.  The  danger  is  that  the  mind  may  not  bear  the 
strain,  that  the  belief  itself  may  crack  and  leave  noth- 
ing. Bunyan  was  hardly  tried,  but  in  him  the  belief 
did  not  crack.  It  spread  over  his  character.  It  filled 
him  first  with  terror  ;  then  with  a  loathing  of  sin,  which 
entailed  so  awful  a  penalty  ;  then,  as  his  personal  fears 
were  allayed  by  the  recognition  of  Christ,  it  turned  to 
tenderness  and  pity. 

There  was  no  fanaticism  in  Bunyan,  nothing  harsh  or 
savage.  His  natural  humor  perhaps  saved  him.  His 
few  recorded  sayings  all  refer  to  the  one  central  ques- 
tion ;  but  healthy  seriousness  often  best  expresses  itself 
in  playful  quaintness.  He  was  once  going  somewhere 
disguised  as  a  wagoner.  He  was  overtaken  by  a  con- 
stable, who  had  a  warrant  to  arrest  him.  The  constable 
asked  him  if  he  knew  that  devil  of  a  fellow  Bunyan. 
"  Know  him  !"  Bunyan  said.  "  You  might  call  him  a 
devil  if  you  knew  him  as  well  as  I  once  did." 

A  Cambridge  student  was  trying  to  show  him  what  a 


JOHN    BL'NYAX.  185 

divine  thing  reason  was — '"  reason,  the  chief  glory  ut 
man,  which  distingnishes  him  from  a  beast,"  etc.,  etc. 
Bunyan  growled  out,  "  Sin  distinguishes  man  from 
beast.     Is  sin  divine  ?" 

He  was  extremely  tolerant  in  his  terms  of  Church 

«, membership.  He  offended  the  stricter  part  of  his  con- 
'gregation  by  refusing  even  to  make  infant  baptism  a 
-Condition  of  exclusion.  The  only  persons  with  whom 
,Jie  declined  to  communicate  were  those  whose  lives  were 
openly  immoral.  His  chief  objection  to  the  Church  of 
England  was  the  admission  of  the  ungodly  to  the  Sacra- 
ments. He  hated  party  titles  and  quarrels  upon  trifles. 
He  desired  himself  to  be  called  a  Christian  or  a  Believer, 

•  or  '*  any  name  which  was  approved  by  the  Holy  Ghost." 
Divisions^  he  said,  were  to  churches  like  wars  to 
countries.  Those  wdio  talked  most  about  religion  cared 
least  for  it  ;  and  controversies  about  doubtful  things, 
and  things  of  little  moment,  ate  up  all  zeal  for  things 
which  were  practicable  and  indisputable. 

"  In  countenance,"  wrote  a  friend,  "  he  appeared  to 
be  of  a  stern  and  rough  temper,  but  in  his  conversation 
mild  and  affable  ;  not  given  to  locpiacity  or  to  much  dis- 
course in  company  unless  some  urgent  occasion  required 
it  ;  observing  never  to  boast  of  himself  or  his  parts,  but 
rather  to  seem  low  in  his  own  eyes,  and  submit  himself 
to  the  judgment  of  others  ;  abhorring  lying  and  swear- 
ing ;  being  just,  in  all  that  lay  in  his  power,  to  his 
word  ;  not  seeming  to  revenge  injuries  ;  loving  to  rec- 
oncile differences  and  make  friendships  with  all.  He 
had  a  sharp,  quick  eye,  with  an  excellent  discerning  of 
persons,  being  of  good  judgment  and  (piiek  wit."  "  He 
was  tall  of  stature,  strong-boned,  though  not  corpulent, 
somewhat  of  a  ruddy  face,  with  s})arkling  eyes,  wearing 
his  hair  on  his  upper  11])  ;  his  luiir  reddish,  but  in  his 


180  SKETCUKS    FRO.\f    J.   A.    FROUDE. 

iater  days  time  liad  sprinkled  it  with  gray  ;  his  nose 
well  set,  but  not  declining  or  bending  ;  his  mouth  moder- 
ate large,  his  forehead  something  high,  and  his  habit 
always  plain  and  modest." 

He  was  himself  indifferent  to  advancement,  and  he 
did  not  seek  it  for  his  family.  A  London  merchant 
offered  to  take  his  son  into  his  house.  "  God,"  he  said, 
"  did  not  send  me  to  advance  my  family,  but  to  preach 
the  Gospel."  He  had  no  vanity — an  exemption  ex- 
tremely rare  in  those  wdio  are  personally  much  before 
the  public.  The  personal  popularity  was  in  fact  the  part 
of  his  situation  which  he  least  liked.  When  he  was  to 
preach  in  London,  "  if  there  was  but  one  day's  notice 
the  meeting-house  was  crowded  to  overflowing." 
Twelve  hundred  people  would  be  found  collected  before 
seven  o'clock  on  a  dark  winter's  morning  to  hear  a  lect- 
ure from  him.  Li  Zoar  Street,  Southwark,  his  church 
was  sometimes  so  crowded  that  he  had  to  be  lifted  to 
the  pulpit  stairs  over  the  congregation's  heads.  It 
pleased  him,  but  he  was  on  the  watch  against  the  pleas- 
ure of  being  himself  admired.  A  friend  complimented 
him  once,  after  service,  on  "  the  sweet  sermon"  which 
he  had  delivered.  "  You  need  not  remind  me  of  that," 
he  said.  "  The  devil  told  me  of  it  before  1  was  out  of 
the  pulpit." 


VII. 

^'-  ■      LEAVES   FROM  A   SOUTH   AFRICAN 
V-  JOURInTAL.* 

In  the  summer  of  1874  I  paid  a  visit  to  South  Africa. 
Having  leisure  on  my  hands,  I  wished  to  use  it  to  stud} 
the  working  of  an  English  colony.  I  had  been  interested 
in  the  exertions  of  Miss  Rye  to  carry  the  waifs  and 
strays  of  our  swarming  population  of  children  to 
countries  where  their  chances  in  after  life  would  be  more 
favorable  than  here,  and  1  desired  to  ascertain  how  far 
the  colonial  authorities  would  be  willing  to  assist  in 
carrying  out  a  systematic  emigration  of  such  children  on 
a  larger  scale.  My  attention  had  been  drawn  especially 
to  South  Africa,  through  what  is  known  as  the  Langa- 
balele  disturbance  in  Natal,  in  which  two  large  native 
tribes  had  been  destroyed.  The  head  of  one  of  them, 
Langabalele  himself,  had  been  tried  and  condemned  by 
Kafir  law,  the  Governor  presiding  in  the  capacity  of 
supreme  chief.  The  proceeding  appeared  to  have  been 
arbitrary  and  violent,  and  1  desired  to  know  the  truth 
about  it.  I  resolved  at  the  same  time  to  extend  my  tour 
to  the  neigliboi'ing  republics.  Between  these  republics 
and  the  Imperial  Government  a  quarrel  had  arisen  in 
consequence  of  the  British  occupation  of  the  lately  dis- 
covered  Diamond    Fields,  which  had  previously  formed 

*  The  political  remarks  of  Mr.  Froude  have  been  omitted  in 
this  collection.— Editok. 


18S  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

part  of  tlie  territoiy  of  tlie  Orange  Free  State.  The 
dispute  bad  interested  me  from  tlie  contradictory  state- 
ments wliicli  I  had  read  about  it.  I  wished  to  learn  the 
liistory  of  the  transaction  from  disinterested  parties 
upon  the  spot,  and  to  learn  especially  how  far  the  annex- 
ation had  been  approved  by  colonial  opinion. 

The  following  pages  contain  extracts  from  the  journal 
which  1  carried  with  me.  A  few  light  sketches  of  the 
society  and  the  scenery  of  a  country  in  which  England 
is  beginning  to  be  interested,  may  serve  as  a  relief  to 
the  serious  subjects  with  which  this  volume  is  chiefly 
ocupied.  1  leave  them  almost  as  they  were  first  written. 
^Vhat  merit  they  possess— if  they  possess  any  merit  at  all 
— will  be  due  to  the  freshness  of  impressions  which  were 
noted  down  as  they  were  formed. 

1874,  August  23. — Left  Dartmouth  in  the  ^Valmer 
Castle.  Full  complement  of  passengers.  Africanders 
all,  or  most  of  them,  with  whom  I  shall  in  time  make 
acquaintance.  Before  1  left  the  harbor  1  was  intro- 
duced to  a  Natal  judge,  who  was  on  his  way  home. 
The  judge  had  been  out  of  the  colony  when  Langabalele 
was  tried,  but  answered  readily  any  questions  which  I 
asked.  He  said  that  in  his  opinion  there  had  been  no 
intention  of  rebellion.  It  v/as  a  mere  police  case,  and 
ought  to  have  been  treated  so  ;  still,  naturally  enough, 
lie  endeavored  to  excuse  the  authorities.  A  youth  at 
dinner,  reflecting,  1  suppose,  colonial  opinion,  insisted 
that  but  for  the  timely  vigor,  etc. ,  which  had  been  dis- 
played, all  Africa  would  have  been  on  fire. 

August  25. — Weather  fine.  Sea  smooth.  Air  grow- 
ing rapidly  hot.  The  passengers  with  whom  I  fall  into 
conversation  speak  of  the  Kafirs  not  unkindly.  They 
describe  them  as  having  splendid  natural  qualities,  but 
as  being  ruined  by  the  mistaken  treatment  which  Eng- 


SOUTH    AFRICAN"    NOTES.  18'.t 

land  insists  upon.  If  the  Dutch  and  the  English  of  the 
colony  were  allowed  to  deal  with  them  in  their  own 
way,  they  conceive  that  the  native  character  might  be 
really  improved  ;  as  it  is  they  look  to  rum  and  brandy 

'-as  the  probable  solution  of  the  problem.  If  rum  and 
brandy,  why  not  strychnine  at  once  ? 

'^'^^  August -20.— ExqulsitG  weather.  The  sea  calm  as 
Torbay  in  stillest  summer.  The  water  \^olet  color. 
jQne  thinks  of  Homer's 

loeiSea  ttovtov. 

Last  night  we  had  a  remarkable  sunset.  The  disk,  as  it 
touched  the  horizon,  was  deep  crimson.  As  the  last 
e6ge  of  the  rim  disappeared  there  came  a  flash,  lasting 
for  a  secondly  of  dazzling  green — the  creation  I  suppose 
of  my  own  eyes.  The  trades  now  beginning.  The  judge 
and  I  talk  and  smoke,  and  gradually  the  condition  of  the 
colony  comes  out.  Colored  men  do  not  serve  on  juries 
in  Natal,  and  the  result  is  what  might  be  expected.  He 
once  himself  tried  a  white  man  who  had  murdered  a 
Kafir,  and  was  caught  red-handed.  The  jury  brought  a 
verdict  of  not  guilty,  and  the  audience  in  the  court 
cheered.  The  judge  said  he  could  hardly  speak  for 
shame.  1  do  not  yet  make  out  the  Boers,  who  are 
described  as  lazy,  indifferent  to  progress  or  money-mak- 
ing, thinking  little  of  politics,  and  only  resenting  Eng- 
lish interference  with  them  ;  yet  most  people  to  whom 
1  talk  seem  to  agree  that  in  the  Orange  Free  State  the 
natives  are  better  managed  than  in  any  other  part  of 
Africa.  Such  a  business  as  that  of  Langabalele  could 
not  possibly  have  happened  there. 

August  31. — Yesterday  was  Sunday  ;  the  sky  over- 
cast and  the  air  close.  The  Captain  read  prayers  in  the 
cabin  in  the  morning.     In  the  evening  the  cparter-deck 


190  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FKUUDE. 

was  cleared  for  chapel.  Lamps  were  liung-  under  the 
awning  and  a  Wesleyan  "conducted  a  service." 
Several  hymns  were  sung,  "  Oh  Paradise  !  oh  Para- 
dise !"  and  "  Rock  of  Ages,"  among  them.  The  choir 
was  composed  of  young  ladies,  whose  week-day  perform- 
ances 1  had  thought  vulgar  and  underbred.  It  was  strange 
to  observe  liow  completely  the  vulgarity  disappeared 
under  the  constraint  of  forms  with  which  they  were 
unable  to  take  liberties.  The  sermon  reminded  me  of 
the  motion  of  a  squirrel  in  a  cage  :  the  repetition  of  a 
single  idea  with  scarcely  a  variation  of  words,  without 
natural  beginning  and  without  natural  end,  and  capable, 
if  necessary,  of  going  on  forever. 

Se2)tember  2. — Reached  St.  Vincent  at  noon  yester- 
day. The  approach  to  the  harbor  lies  between  the  islands 
of  St.  Vincent  and  San  Antonio.  San  Antonio  is  a 
mountain  ridge,  7000  feet  high  and  thirty  miles  long, 
the  sloping  sides  split  into  chasms,  in  which,  so  far  as  I 
could  see,  not  so  much  as  a  blade  of  grass  was  growing. 
St.  Vincent,  on  the  left,  is  naked  rock,  sharp,  jagged, 
and  precipitous,  the  highest  point  of  it  under  3000  feet. 
The  harbor  is  land-locked.  Talk  of  the  sunny  south,  the 
land  of  cypress  and  myrtle  and  orange  grove  !  At  St. 
Vincent  grows  nothing  but  a  dusky  scrub,  in  a  hollow 
into  which  the  wind  has  blown  the  sand.  The  rest  of 
the  island  is  sterile,  stern,  and  savage.  No  kindly  rain 
or  frost  here  jjulverizcs  the  stone  into  soil.  The  peaks 
istand  out  sharp,  like  the  teeth  of  some  primeval  dragon, 
huge  molars  and  incisors,  with  here  and  there  a  gap 
where  a  tusk  has  decayed  with  age.  There  are  no 
springs,  no  streams.  Throughout  the  year  scarcely  a 
shower  falls  there,  and  thei'efore  not  a  green  blade  of 
grass  can  show  itself.  The  town  is  a  coaling  station, 
juuch  frequented  by  passing  steamers.     The  inhabitants 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  191 

are  chiefly  blacks  or  half-castes,  whose  business  is  to  prej 
on  visitors.  Naked  nigger  boys  swim  round  the  ship 
div'ing  for  sixpences.  Black  sirens,  handsome  and  im- 
modest, tempt  the  passengers  into  the  dancing  sahjons, 
which  are  opened  when  a  steamer  comes  in.  What  a 
notion  must  these  wretched  creatures  have  of  the  outer 
wdrld,  from  the  glimpses  which  they  are  tlius  able  to 
get. of  its  passing  occupants.  I  went  over  the  jail, 
which  is  attached  to  the  Governor's  house,  and  the  nig- 
ger turnkey  showed  me  with  a  grin  a  special  ward  re- 
served for  the  English.  The  talk  of  the  colonists  on 
board  ranges  between  wool,  ostrich  feathers,  and  ten  per 
eent  on  freightage.  Colonial  politics  they  regard  as 
avowedly  nothing  but  a  scramble  for  the  plunder  of 
office.  They^bet  every  day  on  the  number  of  the  miles 
which  the  ship  will  have  run  at  noon  in  the  j)ast  twenty - 
four  hours,  and  are  as  eager  about  it  as  Yankees. 

Septernljer  4. — To-day  we  are  exactly  under  the  sun. 
Fresh  stars  come  into  sight  every  night,  and  Sirius 
shines  grandly  like  a  planet.  I  have  been  feeding 
hitherto  on  Greek  Plays  :  this  morning  1  took  Homer 
instead,  and  tlie  change  is  from  a  hothouse  to  the  open 
air.  Tlie  Greek  dramatists,  even  ^Eschylus  himself,  are 
burdened  with  a  painful  consciousness  of  the  problem  of 
human  life,  with  perplexed  theories  of  Fate  and  Provi- 
dence. Homer  is  fresh,  free,  and  salt  as  the  ocean. 
Ulysses  and  Agamemnon  are  once  more  living  and 
breathing  men  Puligion  is  simple  and  unconscious,  and 
the  gods,  rough  and  questionable  as  they  nuiy  be,  are 
without  the  malignity  of  later  centuries.  Achilles, 
when  he  sacrilices  the  Trojan  youths  at  the  tomb  of 
I'atroclus,  is  rather  censured  for  his  cruelty  than  praised 
for  his  devotion.  The  notion  of  human  sacrifice  as  a 
means  of  propitiating  the  anger  of  the  gods  must   have 


192  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE< 

been  imported  from  Phoenicia,  perhaps  with  the  Phoeni- 
cian alphabet,  progress,  and  the  march  of  intellect  ! 

Septe7tiher  C. — We  are  now  in  the  south-east  trade, 
the  sun  to  the  north  of  us,  and  the  heat  less  oppressive. 
I  hear  much  of  the  Capo  Dutch.  The  English  colonists 
seem  not  to  like  them,  and  see  their  characters  askew. 
The  judge  says  a  Boer's  religion  is  like  tlie  Kafir  Obeah. 
He  is  afraid  of  doing  wrong,  because  he  expects  to  be 
damned  for  it.  Perhaps,  substantially,  this  is  the  most 
valuable  part  of  all  religions — so  long  as  it  is  really 
believed. 

Sejjtemher  7. — Sunday,  a  day  of  weariness  :  rest 
when  there  has  been  no  toil  to  rest  from— rest  only 
from  amusement,  and  therefore  not  rest  at  all.  Captain 
W.  read  the  morning  service.  The  divines  (we  have 
two  on  board)  were  both  sick,  and  unequal  to  an  even- 
ing function.  Another  ten  days  ought  to  bring  us  to 
the  Cape.  The  stars  are  changed.  The  pole-star  is 
undel*  the  horizon.  Already  a  new  heaven  ;  in  a  few 
days  tliere  will  be  a  new  earth.  The  sea  is  no  longer 
violet,  but  brilliantly  transparent  bluish  green.  It  is 
spring  this  side  of  the  line.  At  the  Cape  I  shall  find 
the  almonds  coming  into  flower. 

Septeniber  18. — The  south-east  trade  dead  in  our  teeth. 
The  air  grows  colder  and  colder,  for  a  week  past  we  have 
gone  back  to  our  pea-jackets.  The  sea  increases  daily, 
and  the  rolling  becomes  more  violent.  This  morning 
three  distinct  sets  of  waves,  one  set  from  the  south-east, 
in  the  line  of  our  course,  another  from  the  south, 
another  from  the  south-west.  They  did  not  neutralize 
each  other,  but  continued  to  propagate  tliemselves,  each 
in  their  own  direction,  ])roducing  shapes  entirely  new  to 
me.  The  cabins  are  in  confusion  :  books  tumbling  off 
the  shelvef,  portmanteaus  slipping    on  the  floor,  boots 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  193 

and  shoes  dancing  in  wild  disorder.  Every  day  I  grow 
more  convinced  that  colonial  and  all  other  political  ques- 
tions resolve  themselves  into  one  :  What  object  do  the 
ruling  powers  set  before  themselves  ?  Is  it  to  produce  a 
noble  race  of  men,  or  is  it  to  produce  what  they  call 
wealth  ?  If  they  aim  chiefly  at  the  second  they  will  not 
haive  the  first.  Every  wise  man,  whether  Solomon  or 
Plato,  Horace  or  Shakespeare,  has  but  one  answer  on 
this'  subject  :  where  your  treasure  is,  there  will  your 
heart  be.  Let  wealth  be  the  sublime  end  of  our  exist- 
ence, and  no  new  English  nations  will  be  born  in  the 
Cape  or  in  Australia.  England  itself  will  be  a  huge 
grazing  farm,  managed  on  economical  principles,  and 
the  people,  however  rich  they  may  appear,  will  be 
steadily  going^  down  to  what  used  to  be  called  the  Devil. 

Septemher  19. — Four  weeks  out.  Still  rolling,  with  a 
fierce  sea  and  a  head  wind.  I  have  given  up  serious 
books,  and  have  taken  instead  to  "Little  Dorrit. " 
Dickens'  wine  has  an  excellent  flavor,  but  it  is  watered 
for  present  consumption,  and  I  doubt  if  it  will  keep. 
Captain  "W.  tells  me  that  with  S.E.  winds  in  this  lati- 
tude, a  high  barometer  indicates  that  the  wind  will  rise, 
and  that  if  the  mercury  reaches  30*2  (it  has  been  stand- 
ing for  the  last  fortnight  at  30-1),  I  shall  see  a  heavier 
gale  than  I  have  yet  experienced  in  my  life. 

September  21. — Running  into  Table  Bay.  The  moun- 
tain magnificent,  4000  feet  high,  and  hanging  over  the 
town,  with  cliffs  so  sheer  that  a  revolver  would  send  a 
l)ii]lct  from  the  edge  of  the  precipice  into  the  principal 
street. 

September  25. — At  sea  again.  The  three  days,  which 
was  all  that  I  could  at  present  afford  to  Cape  Town, 
have  been  extremely  interesting,  and  have  already 
opened  my  eyes  to  much  wliicli  I  did  not  anticipate. 


iy4  SKETCITRS    FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

Tlie  town  itself,  which  was  built  by  the  Dutch,  is  a 
curious  old-fashioned  place,  with  a  modern  skin  imper- 
fectly stretched  over  it.  You  see  threat  old  mansions  in 
bad  repair,  with  stiff  gardens  overrun  with  weeds,  and 
old  gateways  tlanked  by  couching  lions.  The  Dutch, 
among  their  many  merits,  introduced  pine  and  oak  here. 
The  pine  forests  now  cover  the  sides  of  the  mountain. 
The  oak  grows  rapidly  to  an  enormous  size,  being  in  leaf 
for  nine  months  in  the  year.  Everywhere  you  see  the 
marks  of  the  stiff,  stubborn,  Calvinistic  Holland.  The 
hotel  in  which  I  stayed  was  once  the  house  of  eome 
wealthy  citizen.  The  floors  up-stairs  are  of  stone.  The 
walls  are  panelled,  the  ceilings  carved.  The  sash  win- 
dows are  huge,  heavy,  and  close-fitting.  The  dinner- 
room  is  so  stiff  of  aspect  that  the  pert  modern  waiter 
seems  subdued  by  the  atmosphere  of  it  into  old-fashioned 
politeness.  Cape  Town  has  twice  had  its  day  of  splen- 
dor. Once  under  the  Dutch  government,  and  again 
when  it  was  the  sanatorium  of  Bombay  and  Bengal  and 
the  East  Indian  magnates  used  to  come  there  to  recruit 
their  livers.  Now,  even  now,  it  was  a  pleasant  thing  to 
see  the  English  flag  flying  over  a  spot  which,  whatever 
might  be  its  fortunes,  was  still  the  most  im^iortant  naval 
station  in  the  world. 

Among  other  persons  I  called  on  Mr.  Saul  Solomon, 
whom  1  had  often  heard  of  as  the  advocate  of  the  Exeter 
Hall  policy  toward  the  natives.  Nature  has  been  unkind 
to  Mr.  Solomon.  He  is  scarcely  taller  than  Tom 
Thumb.  It  is  the  more  honorable  to  him  that,  with 
such  disadvantages,  he  has  made  himself  one  of  the 
most  useful,  as  well  as  one  of  the  most  important  per- 
sons in  the  Cape  colony.  The  Colonial  Parliament  and 
Ministry  having  approved  of  the  operations  in  Natal 
against  Langabalole  and  his  tribe,   having  indeed  taken 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  195 

charge  of  Laiigabalele  as  a  state  prisoner,  I  thought  I 
should  learn  from  Mr.  Solomon  what  was  really  to  be 
said  in  defence  of  the  Natal  government.  Mr.  Solomon 
spoke,  on  the  contrary,  in  terms  of  the  strongest  repro- 
bation of  what  had  been  done  ;  but  he  was  shy  of 
promising  any  help  in  the  Cape  Parliament  should  the 
Jitiperial  Government  desire  Langabalele  to  be  released. 
He  seemed  satisfied  to  think  that  the  Imperial  Govern- 
ment was  in  a  mess,  and  must  get  out  of  it  as  well  as  it 
eould.  He  was  cold  also  about  emigration.  White  and 
black  laborers,  he  said,  never  worked  well  together,  and 
he  seemed  generally  afraid  that  if  the  white  race  became 
more  numerous,  the  natives  might  be  handled  less 
scrupulously. 

The  day  following  I  accompanied  the  still  more  emi- 
nent  Mr. to   his   country  house  near  Constantia. 

The  road  lay  through  groves  of  oak.  The  house  itself 
is  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  old,  and  is  well  built,  with 
large  airy  rooms,  strong,  warm,  and  enduring.  Tlie 
solidity  of  everything  here  contrasts  strangely  witli  the 
showy  flimsiness  of  the  mansions  run  up  by  contract  in 
more  modern  settlements.  Mr. is  an  extremely  in- 
teresting person.  He  drove  me  through  the  Constantia 
country,  among  pine  and  oak  forests,  opening  into  ex- 
quisite vineyards,  about  the  slopes  of  the  great  moun- 
tain. Leaving  the  forests,  we  then  struck  across  the 
natural  plains,  clothed  with  silver  trees  and  sugar  bushes, 
and  carpeted  with  wild  heather  and  wild  geraniums,  the 
sea  in  the  distance  soft  and  beautiful  as  the  Mediterra- 
nean. Tlie  peninsula  of  Table  Mountain,  cut  off  from 
the  rest  of  Africa,  would  certainly  make  one  of  the  most 
precious  possessions  in  the  world.  It  could  be  made  im- 
prognable  at  a  moderate  expense.  It  is  alwut  the  size 
of  Madeira,   and   of  infinite   fertility.      It    contains  tlio 


106  SKETCHES    FROir    J.   A.   FROUDF. 

only  harbor  available  for  ships  of  war  either  on  the  east 
or  west  coast  for  many  thousand  miles.  Whoever 
holds  this  peninsula  commands  the  ocean  commerce 
round  the  Cape.  The  peninsula  commands  South 
Africa,  for  it  commands  its  harbors.  "Were  England 
wise  in  her  generation,  a  line  of  forts  from  Table  Bay  to 
False  Bay  would  be  the  northern  limit  of  her  Imperial 
responsibilities. 

Septetnber  27. — We  arrived  yesterday  at  Port  Eliza- 
beth, on  Algoa  Bay,  after  a  rapid  run  of  thirty-nine 
hours,  distance  500  miles  from  Cape  Town.  Port  Eliza- 
beth is  a  handsome  modern  town,  the  chief  port  of  the 
eastern  provinces,  lying  on  an  open  hill-side  as  Brighton 
does.  There  is  no  harbor,  but  the  roadstead  is  sheltered 
on  the  dangerous  quarter,  and  is  crowded  with  vessels  of 
all  sizes.  The  loading  and  discharging  is  by  lighters, 
and  managed  as  expeditiously  as  if  the  ship  was  in  dock. 
The  beach  is  flat  ;  the  available  extent  of  it  has  been 
much  reduced  by  an  attempted  basin,  inclosed  by  wooden 
piers,  which  was  no  sooner  made  than  it  filled  in  with 
sand.  The  bales  and  boxes  are  landed  through  the  surf 
on  the  backs  of  natives  ;  splendid  fellows,  with  the 
shape  of  an  Antinous,  stark  naked,  and  shining  from  the 
water  as  if  they  were  oiled.  The  black  skin,  which  is  of 
the  texture  of  hippopotamus  hide,  seems  to  answer  the 
purposes  of  modesty.  These  fellows  earn  six  shillings  a 
day  ;  they  live  on  one,  save  the  rest,  and  when  they 
have  enough,  they  go  inland,  buy  cattle,  and  two  or 
three  wives  to  work  for  them,  and  do  nothing  the  rest  of 
their  lives.  They  all  have  the  franchise.  I  asked  one 
of  the  members  for  the  town  how  they  managed  at  elec- 
tion times.  "  Oh,"  he  said,  "  we  send  a  few  barrels  of 
brandy  into  the  native  location." 

The   Florence^     Sevtemher    30,     7    a.m.  —  Running 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  197 

along  the  African  coast.  Yesterday,  we  called  at  East 
London,  and  lay  all  day  there  with  a  fearful  roll  dis- 
charging cargo.  East  London  lies  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Buffalo  lliver,  at  the  most  exposed  point  of  the  conti- 
nent. The  shore  is  strewed  with  the  wrecks  of  miser- 
able vessels  which  have  gone  to  pieces  there.  By  and 
by  I  am  told  that  it  is  to  be  the  finest  port  in  the  colony, 
and  so  sanguine  is  the  Colonial  Government  that  exten- 
BiYe  railway  works  are  already  in  progress  in  connection 
with  it.  Inside  the  river  is  like  the  Dart,  and  is  about 
the  same  size,  with  a  fair  depth  of  water  for  a  couple  of 
miles.  The  banks  are  high  and  wooded  with  Mimosa, 
prickly  pear,  the  giant  Euphorbia  Candelabra,  and  other 
trees  which  1  did  not  know.  The  mouth,  unfortu- 
nately, is  at  present  closed  -sv^th  a  sandbar,  over  which, 
by  watching  our  opportunity,  the  day  being  exceptionally 
fine  for  East  London,  we  contrive  to  pass  in  a  life-boat. 
The  engineers'  are  hard  at  work  narrowing  the  entrance, 
which  they  conclude  that  the  scour  of  the  tide  will  then 
keep  open.  But  the  rise  and  fall  even  at  the  springs  is 
only  six  feet,  a  small  force  for  so  large  an  enterprise, 
and  the  Lidian  Ocean  is  a  formidable  enemy.  Mr. 
Leicester,  the  chief  engineer,  is  certain  of  success.  I 
should  have  felt  more  sanguine  if  he  had  been  himself 
less  enthusiastic. 

We  are  now  off  Kreli's  country — indejoendent  Kafir- 
land — a  strip  two  hundred  miles  long,  which  divides 
Katal  from  the  Colony.  "We  pass  within  half  a  mile  of 
the  shore  to  avoid  the  current  which  sets  outside  steadily 
to  the  west.  From  the  sea  it  seems  as  if  Kreli  was  king 
of  Paradise  itself.  A  series  of  exquisite  English  [>arks 
succeed  one  after  the  other  ;  undulating  grassy  lawns, 
interspersed  with  woods  and  divided  every  four  or  five 
miles  by  rivers,  the  course  of  which  we  trace  by  the  pro- 


198  SKETCHES   FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

jecting  crags  and  tlie  ricli  verdure  of  tlie  ravines.  Each 
of  these  streams  is  unhappily  blocked  by  sand  as  East 
London  is.  The  surf  roars  at  their  mouths  with  mo- 
notonous thunder,  never  resting,  never  perhaps  to  rest 
wliile  the  globe  continues  to  revolve.  The  people  of 
the  nation  to  come,  who  w^ill  bj  and  by  fill  this  beautiful 
country,  will  never  sail  in  either  ship  or  boat  on  the 
water  which  they  will  see  so  near  them.  The  steamers 
will  go  by  their  windows  almost  within  hailing  distance, 
but  the  passengers  must  be  carried  on  for  a  hundred 
miles  before  they  can  set  foot  on  shore.  The  skilfullest 
crew  that  ever  launched  a  life-boat  would  be  dashed  in 
pieces  in  a  moment  in  those  tremendous  rollers. 

We  had  excellent  fresh  fish  for  breakfast  this  rhom- 
ing.  Gigantic  mackerel,  twenty  to  thirty  pounds 
weight,  follow  the  steamer.  The  passengers  are  fishing 
for  them  with  halyard  rope  for  lines,  and  flies  construct- 
ed of  strips  of  scarlet  cloth  fastened  on  sharp  hooks. 
The  mackerel  rise  in  the  wake  like  salmon.  We  are 
going  ten  knots.  Four  out  of  five  break  off  from  the 
speed,  a  fifth  catches  tight  hold,  and  three  or  four  of  the 
men  are  required  to  haul  him  in.  We  had  nine  of  these 
monsters  on  the  deck  in  half  an  hour  this  morning.  So 
far  as  my  experience  goes,  they  are  the  only  fish  worth 
eating  that  the  Indian  Ocean  produces. 

On  shore  there  are  few  signs  of  life  and  less  of  culti- 
vation. A  few  herds  of  Kafir  cattle,  a  few  kraals 
(native  villages)  at  long  intervals,  here  and  there  a  black 
figure  slowly  moving  along  the  sands,  seem  the  solitary 
human  occupants  of  a  land  as  fair  as  Homer's  Island  of 
the  Blest. 

We  have  a  distinguished  journalist  on  board.  I  scan- 
dalized him  by  saying  that  I  thought  that  in  a  hundred 
years  newspapers  would  be  abolished  by  general  consent 


SOUTH    AFRICA J^    XOTES.  109 

as  a  nuisance.     A  gazette  of  authentic  news  would  be 
published  by  authority,  and  that  would  be  all. 

I  was  told  a  characteristic  story  of  a  Dutch  farmer  to- 
day.    His  estate  adjoined  the  Diamond  Fields.     Had  he 

-  remained  where  he  was,  he  could  have  made  a  large 
fortune.     Milk,  butter,  poultry,  eggs,  vegetables,  fniit, 

p-'j-an  up  to_  fabulous  prices.     The  market  was  his  own  to 
demand  w-hat  he  pleased.     But  he  was  disgusted  at  the 

^•"intrusion  upon  his  solitude.     The  diggers  worried  him 

'  trom  morning  to  night  demanding  to  buy,  while  he  re- 
quired his  farm  produce  for  his  own  family.  He  sold 
his  land,  in  liis  impatience,  for  a  tenth  of  what  he  might 
have  got  had  lie  cared  to  wait  and  bargain,  mounted  liis 
/wife  and  children  into  his  wagon,  and  moved  off  into  the 
wilderness.  AVhich  was  the  wisest  man  ?  the  Dutcli 
farmer  or  the  Yankee  Englishman  who  was  laughing  at 
him  ?  The  only  book  that  the  Dutchman  had  ever  read 
was  the  Bible,  and  he  knew  no  better.  The  whole  talk 
among  these  people  is  of  diamond  fields,  and  gold  fields, 
and  diamonds  and  gold  never  made  the  material  of  a 
nation,  and  never  will. 

Durban,  October  2. — The  harbor  at  Durban,  named 
after  Sir  Benjamin  D'Urban,  the  most  popular  governor 
who  ever  ruled  at  the  Cape,  is  the  spot  where  Vasco  da 
Gama  landed  on  Christmas  Day,  in  1498.  The  country 
of  which  Durban  is  the  port,  acquired  in  this  way  the 
name  of  Natal.  After  an  interval  of  400  miles  nature 
lias  relaxed  in  her  monotony,  and  has  created  of  herself 
a  channel  of  the  same  kind  as  that  which  Mr.  Leicester 
is  attempting  to  make  at  East  London.  A  high  wooded 
ridge  or  bluff,  curved  and  narrow,  juts  out  from  the 
coast-line,  stretches  parallel  to  it  for  two  miles  toward  the 
east,  and  then  bends  round  and  terminates,  forming  a 
natural  ]>rcakwater.     A  long  point  runs  out  to  meet  it, 


200  SKETCHES    FROM    ,1.    A.   FROUDE. 

and  thus  inside  is  formed  a,  land-loeked  basin  ten  or 
twelve  miles  in  circumference,  the  sea  entering  through 
a  single  narrow  passage,  and  the  scour  from  so  large  a 
body  of  water  being  thus  considerable.  Even  here  there 
is  a  bar  which  the  engineers  in  their  attempts  at  im- 
provement have  made  rather  worse,  but  in  moderate 
weather  vessels  of  1000  tons  can  enter  without  much 
difficulty.  The  scene  as  we  run  m  is  singularly  beauti- 
ful. The  sky  is  cloudless.  The  sun,  just  risen,  is 
faintly  veiled  by  a  soft  Italian  haze.  The  ships  in  the 
bay  are  dressed  out  in  flags,  wliite  puffs  of  smoke  break 
from  a  battery  as  the  guns  are  fired  in  honor  of  the  ar- 
rival of  the  steamer.  We  bring  up  in  a  deep  channel 
close  under  the  bluff,  in  the  shade  of  tropical  trees, 
among  which  the  monkeys  skip  to  and  fro,  and  from 
which  occasionally  a  too-curious  python  makes  his  way 
along  the  cable  by  which  ships  are  moored  to  the  shore. 
"We  land  at  the  custom-house,  among  a  group  of  Natal- 
ians,  who  have  hurried  down  to  meet  their  friends.  I 
am  struck,  as  at  Port  Elizabeth,  with  tlie  florid  fleshy 
look  of  the  settlers.  The  climate  of  the  Cape  suits  well 
the  lymphatic  Teuton.  The  Dutch,  w^ho  have  been 
there  for  two  centuries,  have  expanded  into  the  dimen- 
sions of  Patagonians.  I  walked  with  one  of  the  latter 
along  the  sands  to  the  town.  We  had  to  cross  a  stream, 
and  a  Kafir  undertook  to  carry  us  over.  He  staggered 
under  the  Dutchman,  and  had  nearly  fallen  with  him. 
With  me  he  trotted  away  as  if  I  had  been  a  child.  But 
I  had  as  nearly  dropped  from  him  from  another  cause. 
It  was  my  first  experience  of  the  smell  in  such  close 
proximity. 

October  3. — The  South  African  colonists  are  proud  of 
their  country,  and  are  pleased  to  show  it.  I  should  have 
liked  a  day  to  look  about  me  at  leisure,  but  I  was  in  the 


SOUTH    AFRICAN"   NOTES.  201 

suite  of  a  great  person,  to  "vvliom  it  was  necessary  to 
show  the  sugar  plantations  with  the  least  possible  delay, 
and  I  have  this  moment  returned  from  a  thirty  miles 
drive  over  roads  as  rough  as  Browning^s  poetry,  having 
-been  jolted  into  idiocy,  and  having  three  times  fainted 
^or  very  near  it),  from  the  combined  odor  of  negroes  and 
molasses.  _  But  the  country  is  pretty  enough,  undulating 
in  rounded  hills,  the  soil  red  and  rich,  the  sugar  planta- 
tions most  extensive,  and  considering  the  difficulty  of 
•the  labor  question,  most  creditable  to  ISTatal  energy. 
The  forest,  when  uncleared,  is  rich  with  a  variety  of 
trees,  all  new  to  me,  and  the  varieties  of  wild  creepers 
■which  I  admired  at  East  London.  The  planters'  houses 
,«ire  prettily  surrounded  with  orange  and  lemon  trees. 

The  climate  of  Katal  is  exquisite.  The  days  are  brill- 
iant and  not  overpoweringly  hot.  The  nights  are  cool 
and  fragrant  with  orange  blossoms.  The  stars  shine 
with  a  steady  lustre.  The  fire-flies  gleam.  The  moth- 
hawk  hunts  his  fluttering  prey.  The  Indian  Ocean 
moans  on  the  shore,  and  will  moan  on  till  the  dav  which 
Tintoret  has  painted,  when  the  ships  shall  drift  deserted 
on  the  waves,  and  the  human  inhabitants  of  the  earth 
shall  have  passed  away  from  it  forever. 

Octoher  8. — The  people  are  most  kind,  I  have  been 
staying  for  a  day  or  two  with  a  clever  planter  who  has 
an  estate  and  a  sugar-mill  outside  the  town.  His  house — 
a  very  handsome  one — is  finely  situated  on  a  brow  over- 
looking the  harbor  ;  it  is  itself  of  wood,  and  was  brought 
out  complete  from  Paris.  My  host  talks  much  and 
rather  bitterly  on  the  Nigger  question.  If  the  Kafir 
would  work,  he  could  treble  his  profits.  As  matters  are 
he  depends  mainly  on  coolies.  If  liberality  and  personal 
kindness  would  bring  the  Kafir  into  his  service  he  would 
not  find  the  difficulty  which  ho  does.     There  could  not 


202  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.  FROUDE. 

l)u  a  better  master.  It  is  an  intricate  problem.  Here  in 
Natal  are  nearly  400,000  natives,  who  have  come  in 
imder  shelter  of  the  British  Government,  to  escape  the 
tyranny  of  their  own  chiefs.  They  are  allowed  as  much 
land  as  they  want  for  their  locations.  They  are  polyg- 
amists,  and  treat  their  women  as  slaves,  while  they 
themselves  idle,  or  do  worse.  Of  whites  in  the  colony 
there  are  but  18,000  all  told.  It  is  too  natural  that  the 
whites  should  feel  uneasy. 

There  are  large  pythons  in  the  woods  here.  My  host 
told  me  (perhaps  he  was  playing  with  my  credulity)  that 
one  moonlight  night  he  was  cantering  down  his  avenue, 
meaning  to  sleep  at  his  place  of  business  in  the  town, 
when  he  saw,  as  he  thought,  a  tree  left  lying  on  the 
road.  lie  got  off  to  remove  it,  when  the  tree  became 
alive  and  attacked  him.  He  was  in  evening  dress,  and 
had  no  weapon  of  any  kind.  The  engagement  lasted  for 
twenty  minutes,  when,  getting  tired  of  it,  he  made  a 
slip-knot  in  his  silk  pocket-handkerchief,  passed  it  over 
the  python's  neck,  and  then  drawing  it  tight,  he  jumped 
on  to  his  horse,  and  dragged  the  monster  behind  him 
into  Durban.  There,  as  it  seemed  dead,  he  thrust  it 
into  a  warehouse  for  the  night.  When  he  went  to  look 
at  it  in  the  morning,  it  had  recovered  from  its  adven- 
ture, but  not  wishing  to  renew  the  battle,  dashed  past 
him  into  the  street  and  rolled  away  into  the  forest.  I 
tell  the  tale  as  X.  Y told  it  to  me. 

Last  night  we  had  a  native  musical  exhibition  on  the 
lawn.  Forty  or  fifty  Kafirs  were  brought  in  for  my 
amusement.  A  large  fire  was  made  of  pressed  sugar- 
cane ;  and  then  in  the  distance  we  heard  a  long  low 
monotonous  cry,  growing  louder  as  it  approached,  with 
a  bugle  breaking  in  absurdly  at  intervals.  The  ladies  of 
our  party  arranged  themselves  in  chairs  in  the  veranda. 


<-•/,» 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  203 

Presently  a  naked  figure,  with  featliers  in  his  hair,  ran 
in  on  all-fours  like  a  baboon,  capered  round  the  fire 
dangling  an  assegai  and  disappeared.  More  howling 
followed,  and  the  procession  came  out  from  behind  the 
bushes,  chanting  something  which  was  like  the  baying  of 
hounds  at  the  moon,  and  stamping  violently  in  time. 
The  creatures  ranged  themselves  round  the  tire  and 
squattered  on  their  haunches.  Two  or  three  had  shirts, 
/■  the  rest  had  a  thin  short  wisp  of  goat's  hair  round  their 
'  "loins,  and  that  was  all.  In  the  uncertain  light,  in  which 
they  looked  horribly  apelike,  they  continued  their  song, 
or  whatever  it  was.  "  Ho  ha  yah,  ho  ha  yah,"  growing 
gradually  louder  and  more  guttural  into  '^  ITogh  ha, 
/hunghha,"  till  their  chests  began  to  heave  and  work, 
and  fifty  human  beings  were  grunting  like  so  many  mad 
pigs  inspired  suddenly  with  an  ambition  to  become  nmsi- 
cians.  They  sweated,  they  steamed,  they  swung  their 
clubs  over  their  heads,  pausing  at  intervals  to  gaze  in 
each  other's  faces  with  rolling  eyes  and  shining  teeth,  as 
if  in  rapt  admiration  of  each  other's  loveliness.  Notmtli- 
standing  their  exertions,  they  were  not  exhausted.  They 
continued,  eternally  repeating  the  same  movements  and 
the  same  words.  I  asked  what  the  words  meant.  It  was 
no  more  than  what  a  wolf  intends  by  his  howl.  "  I  like 
killing.  1  Kke  killing  bull  I  like  killing  buck."  The 
sole  variation  being  a  grunt  of  praise  to  the  chief  of  the 
tribe.  "  Ilrunch,  hrunch,  brunch  !"  and  at  the  end  a 
prolonged  "  Ilaugh  !"  in  honor  of  me  as  an  English 
stranger. 

Such  is  the  free  Kafir  of  Natal,  as  he  lives  at  his  own 
sweet  will  under  the  shelter  of  the  British  dominion. 
Under  his  chief  in  the  forest  he  is  at  least  a  man.  Trained 
and  disciplined  under  European  authority,  he  might  be- 
come as  fine  a  specimen  of  manhood  as  an  English  or 


204  SKETCHES   FKOM    J.   A.   FROUDE, 

Irish  j)oliceman.  Left  at  liberty  to  do  as  he  pleases,  this 
is  what  he  becomes.  Do  we  think  the  black  races  so 
superior  to  Europeans  that  they  can  improve  without 
training  ?  Our  grandfathers  treated  them  as  cattle  ;  we 
treat  them  as  if  it  were  a  sin  to  lay  them  under  the  same 
restraint  as  our  own  children.  Our  cruelty  and  our  ten- 
derness are  alike  fatal  to  them  ;  the  second,  perhaps,  is 
the  most  fatal  of  the  two. 

Maritzburg^  October  17. — Arrived  here  a  week  ago, 
after  a  picturesque  drive  of  fifty  miles  on  the  mail-cart. 
After  leaving  the  coast  and  the  sugar  plantations,  signs 
of  cultivation  disappear  almost  wholly.  There  are  a  few 
farms  scattered  along  the  roadside,  but  with  little  sign 
of  work  upon  them.  The  energy  of  the  colony  has  gone 
into  the  transport  department.  The  enormous  wealth 
suddenly  developed  at  the  Diamond  Fields  has  revolu- 
tionized South  Africa.  Horses,  men,  and  cattle  are  out 
upon  the  roads  wagon-driving  between  the  Fields  and  the 
ports.  The  poor  Kafirs  must  have  many  merits.  The 
farmers  go  away,  leaving  their  houses  and  their  families 
and  property  undefended.  No  outrage  is  e\-er  heard  of. 
The  wag(Mis  are  sent  many  hundred  miles  through  a 
country  almost  uninhabited.  They  are  loaded  with  a 
thousand  articles  which  the  natives  much  covet,  and 
highway  robbery  is  unknown.  Yet  the  whites  are  afraid 
of  them.  No  wonder,  considering  the  disproportion  of 
numbers.  If  they  could  be  induced  to  work  they  would 
be  manageable  ;  but  the  settlers  legitimately  dread  the 
effects  of  deliberate  idleness  supported  by  polygamy  and 
female  slavery,  on  the  native  character. 

At  Maritzburg  I  am  occupied  in  preparing  for  my 
journey  into  the  Free  States.  My  equipage  will  be  a 
strong  African  cart,  six  mules,  a  tent,  a  gun  and  a  rifle, 
a  black  driver,  and  a  joung  Dutchman,  son  of  a  member 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  205 

of  the  Natal  Council,  who  goes  with  me  to  interpret  and 
be  otherwise  useful.  Maritzburg  being  the  seat  of 
Government,  I  find  an  unexpectedly  cultivated  and 
agreeable  society  there,  and  my  friend  the  judge,  who 
has  accompanied  me  from  Dartmouth,  is  the  most  charm- 
ing of  hosts. 

.-';i  The  country  round  is  at  present  a  mere  desert.  How 
beautiful  it  will  one  day  be,  when  it  is  irrigated  and 
planted,  a  single  specimen  of  what  the  soil  can  produce 

'  will  suffice  to  show. 

Six  years  ago  the  judge,  who  understands  gardening, 
purchased  forty-five  acres  of  perfectly  open  moor.     The 

^  spot  which  he  selected  was  well  situated,  and  sheltered 
tty  a  mountain,  down  which  falls  a  stream  of  water.  He 
fenced  his  ground  in,  and  round  the  borders  he  sow^ed 
the  seeds  of  a  variety  of  coniferse  and  the  Australian 
eucalyptus.  In  this  short  interval  the  seeds  have  shot  up 
into  trees  forty  or  fifty  feet  high.  Passing  through 
them  you  find  yourself  among  groves  of  oranges,  and 
lemons,  and  citrons,  and  limes,  figs,  peaches,  apricots, 
and  almonds.  On  a  favorable  slope  are  a  few  acres  of 
coffee-trees  loaded  with  fruit.  You  leave  the  coffee  and 
you  are  among  flowering  trees  and  shrubs.  In  a  hollow 
is  a  sheet  of  water,  fringed  with  roses,  azaleas,  and  gera- 
niums. There  is  so  much  shade  that  you  never  feel  the 
heat  oppressive.  If  you  require  refreshment,  you  can 
stroll  among  the  strawberry  beds,  or  if  you  prefer  it, 
among  pineapples  and  melons.  Whatever  of  rare  or 
beautiful,  either  of  the  Old  World  or  the  New,  European, 
African,  or  American,  will  flourish  in  this  climate  and 
soil,  the  judge  has  here  cultivated,  and  so  admirable  are 
both  that  each  plant  contends  with  its  neighbor  which 
shall  spring  the  soonest  to  the  highest  perfection. 

We  had  our  luncheon   in  a  dripping  cave,   festooned 


20G  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

with  ferns,  at  tlie  edge  of  a  waterfall.  A  fairer  haunt 
was  never  seen  for  legendary  spirit,  and  I  had  poured  a 
silent  libation  to  the  nymph  of  the  grotto  before  I  re- 
membered that  I  was  in  a  land  where  there  was  neither 
nymph  nor  fairy,  faun  nor  saint.  These  airy  beings  do 
not  thrive  in  English  colonies  under  constitutional 
governments. 

Bushman'' s  River,  October  24. — The  road  through 
Katal  is  a  gradual  ascent  from  the  sea  level  to  the  high 
plateau  of  the  interior.  From  the  summit  of  the 
Drachenberg  range,  the  fall  on  the  eastern  side  is  marked 
by  all  the  characters  of  mountain  scenery  ;  sharp  preci- 
pices, abrupt  ravines,  and  rivers  leaping  down  in  a  suc- 
cession of  cascades.  When  I  pass  the  crest,  I  am  told 
that  I  shall  find  myself  on  a  boundless  plain,  sloping 
westward  imperceptil^ly  for  a  thousand  miles  to  the 
Atlantic.  The  roadside  is  fringed  with  the  skeletons  of 
the  wretched  mules  and  oxen,  which,  overdriven  and 
brutally  treated,  have  dropped  out  of  the  wagon  teams 
and  have  fallen  down  and  died.  In  a  few  hours  their 
bones  are  cleaned  b}^  the  vultures.  We  are  now  5000 
feet  above  the  sea.  The  Draclienberg  is  right  in  front 
of  us,  looking  like  the  Pyrenees  from  Dax,  the  colors 
only  softer  and  more  Italian.  The  farms  appear  more 
and  more  neglected.  I  have  not  seen  one  laborer  work- 
ing in  the  fields  since  I  left  Maritzburg.  Horse,  man, 
and  ox  are  on  the  roads.  It  is  all  right,  economically,  I 
suppose.  More  money  is  to  be  made  in  this  way.  And 
the  remains  of  the  miserable  cattle  which  have  been 
flogged  to  death  ?  Well,  they  must  have  died  some 
time. 

The  camping  places  are  strewed  with  broken  tins  and 
fragments  of  Hennessy's  brandy  bottles.  The  Kafir 
costume  varies  with  the  climate.     Down  at  Durban  it 


SOUTH   AFRICAN    NOTES.  207 

was  a  liat  and  shoes,  or  more  often  neither.     Up  here 

the  air  is  colder,   and  a  cast-off  soldier's  jacket  is  in 

fashion,  lower  garments    being  dispensed  with    everj^- 

where.     In  the  park  at  Maritzburg  I  saw  a  dandy  Katir 

-srroom  holdino-  the  horses  of  a  curricle.     He  had  a  short 

smartly  cut  groom's  coat,  a  hat  with  cockade,  and  noth- 

^fOg  else.      Ilis  lower  limbs  shone  so  brightly  that  they 

appeared  to  be  polislied  with   blacking.     The  hotels  on 

^'e  road  are  tolerable,  bnt  the  manners  of  the  colonists 

office  I  left  Maritzburg  do  not  improve.     In  the  English 

colonies — in  South  Africa  at  any  rate — there  are  a  set  of 

people  who  answer  to  the  mean  whites  of  the  Southern 

States  of  America.     A  large  part  of  our  emigrants  are 

jHore  or  less  vagabonds,  whom  their  friends  have  got  rid 

•of.     When  they  see  out  here  any  one  who  looks  like  a 

gentleman  tliey  make  it  their  business  to  teach  him  at 

once  that  he  is  not  in  England  by  a  rudeness  which  they 

mistake  for  independence.     They  suppose  this  country  to 

be  virtually  a  republic,  and  they  consider  courtesy  to  bo 

a  bad  tradition  of  the  Old  World. 

Tugeld  River,  Octoher  25. — A  lovely  evening,  with  a 
full  moon,  and  a  soft  east  wind  blowing.  I  have  been 
pitting  in  the  veranda  of  the  hotel,  reluctant  to  go  in. 
The  landscape,  the  great  forms  of  which  are  always 
beautiful,  can  here  be  best  enjo^^ed  at  night,  when  the 
dead  oxen  are  no  longer  visible,  or  the  nakedness  to 
which  the  country  is  doomed  by  the  laziness  of  man. 
The  land  here,  as  elsewhere,  is  boundlessly  fertile.  A 
large  river  runs  throufj^h  it  with  abundant  f;ill.  Irrimi- 
tion  is  perfectly  easy,  yet  nothing  is  done.  At  this  hotel 
we  drink  the  dirty  drain  water.  I  asked  the  landlord  if 
he  had  no  well.  Within  twenty  feet  of  the  surface 
there  was  obviously  pure  water  in  abundance.  '*  A 
well  !"  he  said,  indignantly  ;  "  and  who  is  to  dig  it  { 


208  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

The  Government  won't  make  tlie  Kafirs  work,  and  if 
they  want  wells,  thej  must  make  them  themselves." 

Hotel  under  the  Drachenherg,  frontier  of  the  Free 
State,  Oetoher  27.  —  Here  at  least  in  the  mountains, 
where  the  hill-sides  and  valleys  are  watered  by  nature,  1 
lioped  that  I  should  at  last  taste  fresh  milk.  But  I 
could  get  only  the  eternal  tinned  milk  from  Switzerland, 
and  they  are  out  of  vegetables,  for  an  expected  cargo  of 
potatoes  has  not  arrived  from  Limei'ick.  My  landlord 
at  the  Draclienberg,  however,  is  not  of  the  idle  sort. 
He  is  a  Boer,  the  first  that  I  have  seen,  large-boned, 
healthy,  and  good-humored.  He  is  a  cattle  and  horse 
breeder,  and  being  on  the  border,  has  a  farm  on  the 
edge  of  it,  where,  undei  the  Free  State  laws,  the  Kafir 
servants  can  be  better  depended  on. 

I  leave  Natal  vnt\\  unhopeful  feelings.  The  settlers 
themselves  are  not  to  blame.  In  the  presence  of  a  vast 
and  increasing  native  population,  encouraged  in  idleness 
by  the  indulgence  of  those  detestable  systems  of  polyg- 
amy and  female  slavery,  it  is  impossible  to  expect  white 
men  to  exert  themselves  for  the  genuine  improvement 
of  the  colony.  But  the  fact  remains,  that  a  country 
which  seems  to  have  been  made  by  nature  to  be  covered 
with  thriving  homesteads  and  a  happy  and  prosperous 
people,  is  given  over  to  l^arrenness  and  desolation.  Be- 
fore there  can  be  a  change,  some  authority  must  be  in- 
troduced there  which  will  control  both  blacks  and  whites, 
and  bring  the  relations  between  them  into  a  more  natural 
condition.  The  sole  remedy  thought  of  here  is  more 
freedom,  and  what  they  call  a  "  'sponsible  ministry." 
They  look  to  America,  and  they  fancy  the  colonies  have 
only  to  be  free  to  grow  as  the  United  States  have 
grown.  America  was  colonized  hefore  the  aloe  had  blos- 
somed.    The  grain  of  the  old  oak  is  in  New  England. 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  209 

The  English  in  South  Africa  are  pnlpy  endogens. 
They  may  make  a  nation  some  day,  bnt  they  liave  a 
long  journey  to  travel  first. 

One  would  like  to  knoAv  the  reflections  which  the  aloe 
makes  upon  itself  when  it  throws  up  its  flowering  stem. 
Did  ever  plant  make  such  unexampled  progress  ?  and 
progress  so  sure,  too  ;  for  is  not  the  flower  the  promise  of 
the  seed  of  future  aloes,  the  heart  of  the  aloe's  life  ? 
Qfie  splendid  leap  and  bound,  and  a  dull  prickly  shrub 
Itas  shot  into  a  tree,  which  is  fringed  with  pendant  bells. 
Each  infant  aloe  colony  at  its  side,  blossoms  too  in  tiny 
mimicry,  saying  to  its  parent,  "  Am  not  1  as  good  as 
you?  or  possibly  better?"  How  little  either  of  them 
kiK)w  the  price  which  must  be  paid  for  their  burst  of 
vanity  !  America  was  not  established  in  this  way.  The 
price  is  death. 

Tlarrismith^  Orange  Free  State,  Oatoher 'i^. — Crossed 
into  the  Free  State  yesterday.  The  top  of  the  pass  is 
1800  feet  above  the  hotel.  Our  cart  was  dragged  up  by 
oxen.  The  mules  walked.  The  road  on  the  Natal  side 
winds  up  against  the  face  of  the  mountain.  We  arrive 
at  the  top,  and  find,  as  I  was  led  to  expect,  a  plain  level 
and  boundless  as  the  sea.  ITarrismith,  the  first  place  we 
come  to,  is  named  after  Sir  Harry  Smith,  of  Aliwal  and 
Kafir  war  notoriety,  and  is  a  growing,  well-conditioned 
town.  The  change  of  government  is  already  apparent  in 
the  absence  of  loafing  natives.  The  Free  State  laws 
against  vagrancy  are  strict.  Every  man  found  wander- 
ing about  may  ])c  called  on  to  show  how  he  is  gaining 
his  subsistence,  and  if  he  can  give  no  satisfactory  account 
of  himself,  he  is  set  to  woik  on  the  roads. 

Leokof  {Lion-head^,  Saturday,  Octoher  31. — I  was  in 

luck  at  Harrismitli.     T   fell   :iv  with  Sir  M.  B ,  an 

English  baronet,  ex-caj)taiii  of  dragoons,  who  after  some 


210  SKETniRR    FROM    J.    A.    FROITDE. 

years  of  service  in  India,  was  obliged  by  bad  health  to 
leave  the  army,  and  not  wishing  to  idle  away  the  remain- 
der of  his  life  in  England,  determined  to  settle  as  a 
farmer  in  South  Africa.     He  entered  into  partnership 

with  another  Englishman,  Mr. ,  an  extreme  Radical, 

but  as  Sir  M. said,  with  apparent  surprise  at  the 

possibility  of  such  a  thing,  "  a  gentleman  to  the  heels  of 
h/j  boots."  They  bought  two  tracts  of  land,  one  in  the 
Transvaal,  one  in  the  Free  State,  and  five  years  ago  Sir 

M. was  set  down  on  the  estate  which  was  to  be  his 

future  home,  sixty  miles  east  of  Harrismith.  It  con- 
sisted of  19,000  acres  of  grassy  wilderness,  without  so 
much  as  a  shed  or  Kafir  hut  upon  it,  with  a  round  kopf 
or  hill,  flat  at  top,  with  steep  sides,  rising  out  of  the 
middle  of  it,  which  a  few  years  since  was  a  noted  lion 
preserve.  The  plains  were  still  covered  with  infinite 
herds  of  antelopes.  His  nearest  neighbor  was  a  Boer, 
twelve  miles  distant.     He  was  unmarried  and  alone. 

Up  to  this  time  Sir  M. had  lived  in  the  luxury  of 

a  smart  cavalry  regiment,  and  had  never  had  less  than 
three  or  four  servants  to  anticipate  every  want.  In 
South  Africa  at  starting  he  had  nothing  to  depend  on 
but  himself.  He  built  his  house  with  his  own  hands, 
with  only  a  native  or  two  to  help  him.  He  made  fences 
and  sheds  and  farm-buildings.  He  gathered  cattle, 
sheep,  and  horses  about  him.  He  drove  his  own  plough, 
he  sheared  his  own  lambs,  he  was  his  own  mason,  house 
carpenter,  cook,  and  housemaid.  Gradually  he  gathered 
servants  and  laborers  about  him,  as  a  man  who  will  work, 
himself  is  sure  to  do.  The  hardest  part  of  the  business 
is  over.  His  farming  prospers,  and  he  is  steadily  and 
surely  making  a  fortune. 

I  met  Sir  M. at  dinner  at  Harrismith.      He  was 

to  return  to  Leokof  the  next  day,  and  he  invited  me  to 


SOUTH    AFRICAK    NOTES.  211 

go  with  him.     It  lay  on  my  own  road  to  Pretoria,  so  it 
was  settled  that  my  cart    and  mules    should  follow  at 

leisure.     Sir  M. took  charge  of  me  in  his  dog-cart, 

and  we  started  with  four  half -broken  horses,   which  he 
-drove  splendidly.     We  slept  on  the  road  at  a  winkel^  or 

;i9adside  store,  where  Sir  M. had   an  enthusiastic 

"^"welcome.     In  the  morning  we  started    early,  and  were 

here  to  breakfast.     Sir  M. is  a  tall  handsome  man 

about  forty,  with  a  hooked  nose,  a  gray  soldier's  eye,  a 
'well-cut  chin  ;  and  in  face,  figure,  and  mind  a  thorough- 
bred aristocrat.  By  courtesy,  uprightness,  and  natural 
superiority  he  coirmiands  the  respect  of  the  Boers.  lie 
accepts  his  situation,  not  cheerfully,  but  without  com- 
plaint, sustained  by  tlie  consciousness  of  success,  and  too 
proud  to  quarrel  wdth  a  lot  which  he  has  made  for  him- 
self. Nature  is  hard  up  here  6000  feet  above  the  sea. 
No  more  orange  groves  and  rose  gardens  ;  but  the  tree- 
less, shelterless  plain,  with  the  fierce  sun  by  day  and 
frosts  at  night,  and  thunder-storms  beyond  the  worst  1 

have  ever  witnessed  in  Europe.     Sir  M. is  showing 

what  an  Englishman  can  still  be.  It  is  a  rehef  to  me 
after  what  I  saw  in  Natal,  and  I  admire  the  character 
that  has  fought  through  so  rude  a  trial.  At  meals  he 
has  but  one  table,  and  he  sits  himself  at  the  head  of  it, 
witli  his  white  servants  on  each  side  of  him,  well  man- 
nered and  respectful.  So  it  was  in  England  for  many 
centuries,  while  the  feudal  loyalty,  which  democracy  has 
not  yet  wholly  worn  away,  made  its  way  into  the  blood 
of  our  race.  So  old  Cato  dined  with  his  serfs  in  the 
farm  kitchen,  probably  on  just  such  fare  as  we  had  before 
us  to-day  :  soup,  mutton,  bread,  and  a  glass  or  two  of 
wine  of  the  country. 

Novemher  4. — On  the  road  to  the  Vaal  River — First 
experience  of  camping  out.     I  am  alone  in  my  tent  with 


212  SKETCHKS    FHOM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

a  glaring  snn  raising  tlie  temperature  inside  to  90  de- 
grees. The  mules  have  strayed,  being  insufficiently 
hobbled.  I  sent  Charley,  my  black  driver,  in  search  of 
them  in  the  early  morning.  He  returned  with  his  face 
as  near  white  as  nature  permitted,  declaring  that  the 
devil  had  jumped  out  of  the  ground  at  his  feet  with  four 
young  ones.  I  suppose  it  was  an  ant-bear.  Any  way 
the  n  ules  are  lost.  He  has  gone  back  to  our  last 
halting-place  to  look^  for  them.  My  other  youtli  has 
started  with  a  rifle  to  shoot  buck,  which  are  round  us  in 
tens  of  thousands,  and  liere  am  I  by  the  side  of  a  pond 
which  is  trampled  by  the  antelopes  into  mud  soup,  the 
only  stuff  in  the  shape  of  water  which  we  have  to  depend 
on  for  our  coffee,  and,  alas  !  for  our  washing.  To  add 
to  the  pleasure  of  the  situation  the  season  of  the  thunder- 
storms has  set  in.  The  lightning  was  playing  round  us 
all  yesterday  afternoon,  and  we  shall  now  have  a  stonn 
daily.  Whole  teams  of  oxen  are  often  killed.  To  a 
white  man,  they  say,  there  is  no  danger  while  he  has  a 
black  at  his  side,  the  latter  being  the  better  conductor. 
When  one  is  struck  another  must  be  immediately  substi- 
tuted. 

The  Boers  are  shooting  on  the  hills  round  me.  They 
ride  up  to  the  herds  and  fire  into  the  middle  of  them,  a 
cart  follows  to  carry  the  game,  and  the  vultures  wheel  in 
hundreds  overhead  on  the  watch  for  the  wounded. 
These  antelopes  consume  the  grass,  and  must  be  exter- 
minated before  sheep  and  cattle  can  be  reared. 

Ileidelherg^  November  7. — A  young  Boer  brought  in 
the  mules,  whicli  he  found  fifteen  miles  off,  making 
tlieir  way  back  to  Xatal.  We  were  soon  on  the  I'oad 
again,  and  yesterday  evening  crossed  the  Yaal  River. 
We  are  now  in  the  Transvaal  Republic,  the  Alastia  of 
South  Africa,  where  every  runaway  from  justice,  every 


SOUTH    AFRICAX    NOTES.  213 

broken-down  speculator,  every  reckless  adventurer  linds 
an  asylum  ;  while  the  gold  just  discovered  is  tempting 
stray  Californians  and  Australians  to  try  their  fortune 
tliere  as  well. 

^-  Pretoria^  November  12. — At  the  farthest  point  of  my 
iourney.     Pretoria,  the  capital  of  the  Transvaal  and  the 

;^«^at  of  govfirnment  of  its  famous  President,  lies  in  a  basin 
snrrounded  by  rocky  hills,  at  the  rise  of  the  Limpopo 
itiver.     Springs  of  abundant  and  beautifully  clear  water 

'break  out  in  the  adjoining  valleys.  The  Dutch,  who 
have  a  genius  for  irrigation,  have  carried  open  conduits 
alone:   the   streets.     The    trees   in   the   moistened    soil 

^flourish  with  the  greatest  luxuriance.  We  have  descend- 
ed 2000  feet  from  Harrismith  ;  and  although  the  place 
is  not  yet  a^uarter  of  a  century  old,  you  seem  as  you 
come  down  into  the  hollow  of  Pretoria,  to  be  entering  a 
forest  of  eucalyptus  and  oleander. 

Potscheff Strom,  November  20. — On  the  road  once 
more.  On  my  way  to  this  place  from  Pretoria  I  spent  a 
night  at  the  house  of  a  representative  Transvaal  Boer, 
01)erholster  by  name.  Camping  out  has  grown  disagree- 
able. The  forenoons  are  clear  and  hot.  About  two 
o'clock  ilecks  of  cloud  begin  to  show.  By  sunset  the 
horizon  is  black  all  round,  distant  lightning  flashing  in 
every  direction.  The  air  becomes  deathly  still,  and  by 
this  time  your  tent  must  be  pitched,  and  a  trench  dug 
round  it  ;  your  cart  must  be  secured,  and  your  belong- 
ings lashed  as  tight  as  ropes  can  bind  them.  Suddenly, 
with  a  loud  roar,  comes  a  hurricane,  sending  dust,  sand, 
gravel,  whisking  past,  as  if  the  bags  of  ^olus  had  burst. 
This  lasts  five  minutes  or  so.  Again  a  pause,  and  then 
the  artillery  of  heaven  opens  out  upon  you,  a  crash  as  if 
from  a  thousand  cannon,  east,  west,  north,  south,  over- 
head and  everywhere.     The  forked  lightning  blazes  Mnth- 


214  SKETCHES    FROM    .T.    A.   FROt'DE. 

out  interval,  red,  white,  blue,  green  The  rain  happily 
pours  in  cataracts  along  with  it,  or  the  trees  and  animals 
exposed  would  fare  worse  than  they  do.  This  sort  of 
thing  continues  six  or  seven  hours,  and  is  repeated 
almost  every  day  while  the  wet  season  lasts,  so  that  a 
tent,  notwithstanding  the  suj^erior  cleanliness  of  it,  no 
longer  forms  the  most  comfortable  of  night  lodgings. 

My  old  Boer  host  on  this  occasion  is  a  patriarch  of 
sixty.  His  farm  is  large,  well  planted,  and  well  culti- 
vated, and  inside  his  house  and  outside  there  is  an  ap- 
pearance of  rude  abundance.  On  his  hall  table  stands  a 
huge  clamped  Bible  of  1750,  with  a  register  of  the 
family  for  120  years.  His  sons  and  daughters  are 
married,  and  live  with  their  wives  and  husbands  in  cot- 
tages on  the  estate  at  no  great  distance.  With  each  new 
family  another  hundred  acres  have  been  fenced  in  and 
brought  under  the  plough.  Children  and  grandchildren 
dropped  in  for  the  evening  meal  at  the  common  table, 
young  giants,  handsome,  grave,  and  ponderous,  and 
bright-eyed  girls  dashing  through  the  doors  out  of  the 
storm,  and  flinging  off  their  dripping  hoods.  Our  sup- 
per consisted  of  cold  venison,  eggs,  bread,  and  Indian 
corn,  with — here  at  any  rate — fresh  milk.  The  old  man 
said  a  long  grace  before  and  after.  I  glanced  at  the 
youths.  There  was  not  a  sign  of  weariness  about  them. 
Their  manners  were  perfectly  simple  and  reverent. 

My  bed  was  rough,  but  clean,  and  I  was  not  disturbed 
by  intruders.  In  the  morning  I  was  awoke  by  a  psalm, 
with  which  the  day's  work  always  begins  on  a  Boer's 
farm.  The  breakfast  was  like  the  supper  overnight. 
The  old  lady  and  two  young  ones,  who  alone  appeared 
of  the  party  of  the  evening  before,  looked  as  stiff  and 
prim  as  if  they  had  walked  out  of  one  of  Van  Eyck's 
pictures. 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  215 

The  Diamond  Fields,  Noveiriber  28. — The  storms  put 
an  end  to  mj  gy P^J  \\i^.  I  sold  mv  cart,  mules,  and 
guns  at  Potscheffstrom,  sent  my  two  lads  home  by  a 
wagon  to  Natal,  and  took  to  the  mail-cart.  The  roads 
are  mere  tracks,  littered  with  stones  the  size  of  thirty- 
two-pound  cannon-balls.  The  mail  travels  night  and 
dijy,  with  ten  mules  or  horses,  and  plunges  on  with 
supreme  disregard  either  of  rock  or  hole.  The  cart  is 
roofed  and  curtained  with  leather,  the  brass  buttons  by 
which  the  curtains  are  fastened  being  so  conveniently 
arranged  that  at  each  jolt  you  are  likely  to  have  your 
temple  cut  or  your  cheek  laid  open.  The  distance  from 
Potscheffstrom  to  this  place  is  from  four  to  five  hundred 
miles.  I  had  several  fellow-passengers,  all  characteristic 
of  the  spot  for  which  I  was  Iwund.  One  was  a  Jew 
diamond  dealer,  another  a  storekeeper,  another  a  digger, 
another  a  land  shark  or  speculator.  A  fifth  amused  and 
instructed  me.  "  When  I  first  came  to  this  country, 
sir,"  he  said,  "  1  tried  industry  ;  but  it  didn't  pay,  and  1 
took  to  scheming  and  did  better."  His  schemmg  con- 
sisted in  going  to  England  when  the  Diamond  diggings 
were  opened,  buying  a  gambling  and  drinking  saloon 
with  all  necessary  fittings,  securing  the  services  of  half  a 
dozen  young  ladies  from  the  Ilaymarket  to  attend,  and 
carrying  it  all  out  and  setting  it  going.  With  this  con- 
trivance he  made  thirty  or  forty  thousand  pounds  in  one 
year,  but  he  lost  it  the  next  in  gambling.  "  Alas  !"  he 
said,  all  that  1  touch  turns  to  gold.  Any  fool  can  make 
a  fortune  here,  but  it  requires  a  wise  man  to  keep  it." 

On  the  evening  of  the  third  day  after  leaving  Pot- 
scheffstrom, we  came  down  to  the  Vaal  River,  intending 
to  cross  in  a  ferry-boat  an  hour  before  sunset.  The 
thunder-clouds  unf(>rtunately  had  gathered  up  that  after- 
noon blacker  than  I  had  yet  seen  them.     Between  four 


210  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   EROUDE. 

and  five  o'clock  the  storm  l)egan,  and  between  the  dark- 
ness and  the  blinding  effects  of  the  lightning,  in  tlie  in- 
terv^als  of  the  flashes  we  could  scarcely  see  ten  yards 
from  us.  Even  in  Sonth  Africa  I  never  saw  such  a  dis- 
play of  celestial  fireworks.  The  lightning  was  rose  color, 
deepening  at  times  to  crimson.  Each  flash  appeared  like 
a  cross,  a  vertical  line  seeming  to  strike  the  earth,  a 
second  line  crossing  it  horizontally.  The  air  was  a  blaze 
of  tire.  The  rain  fell  in  such  a  deluge  that  the  plain  in 
a  few  minutes  was  like  a  lake.  Of  course  we  could  not 
move.  The  horses  stood  shivering  up  to  their  fetlocks  in 
water.  At  one  time  there  was  no  interval  between  the 
flash  and  the  report,  so  that  w^e  were  in  the  very  centre 
of  the  storm.  The  sense  of  utter  helplessness  prevented 
me  from  being  nervous  ;  I  sat  still  and  looked  at  it  in 
mere  amazement.  In  two  hours  it  was  over.  The  sky 
cleared  almost  suddenly,  and,  with  the  dripping  land- 
scape shining  in  the  light  of  a  summer  sunset,  we 
splashed  on  to  the  river,  here  about  as  broad  as  the 
Thames  at  Westminster.  "We  crossed  M'ith  some 
trouble,  the  ferry-boat  being  half  full  of  water.  Night 
being  now  on  us  in  earnest,  we  had  to  wait  at  the  ferry- 
man's hut  till  the  moon  rose.  He  had  caught  some 
barbel  (so  he  called  them)  in  the  river  with  night  lines. 
One  of  these  monsters,  as  big  as  a  moderate-sized  pig, 
with  an  enormous  head  and  long  horns,  the  conductor 
l)0ught,  to  take  on  and  sell  at  the  Diamond  Fields. 
The  diggers  are  open-handed,  and  the  price  of  anything 
at  Kimberley  (as  my  speculating  friend  told  me)  is 
whatever  the  owner  likes  to  ask.  1  objected  to  this  ad- 
dition to  our  compan_y  in  the  wagon,  so  it  was  lashed  to 
the  pole  underneath,  the  tail  flapping  on  the  sands.  At 
10.30  we  started  (having  lost  time  to  make  up)  with  ten 
half-broken  horses.     I  asked  how  the  road  was,  and  got 


r.. 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  217 

a  shrug  for  an  answer.     In   a   few    minutes  we  were 
bounding  at  full  speed  over  a  track  littered  with  cannon- 
balls,  and  our  bodies  flying  like  shuttlecocks  between  our 
seats  and  the  roof.     I  for  one  felt  as  if  I  should  go  to 
,-pieces.     At  intervals  the  conductor  looked  in,  coolly  say- 
'ing,  "  Well,  gentlemen,  how  do  you  feel  yourselves  ?" 
P-',i  He  knew  by  experience,  I  suppose,  that  we  should  be 
none  the  worse  for  it,  and  people  do  not  go  to  South 
^iricsL  to  be  comfortable.     Enough  that  at  ten  this  morn- 
'iffg  we  arrived  at  the  spot  which  has  caused  so  much 
heart-burning  in  South  African  society,  and  disturbed 
the  market  for  jewels  all  over  the  world. 

The  town  of  Kimberley,  so  called  because  Lord  Kim- 
berley  was  the  Colonial  Minibter  who  is  responsible  for 
the  annexation  of  this  precious  possession,  is  like  a 
squalid  Wimbledon  Camp  set  down  in  an  arid  desert. 
The  houses  are  of  iron,  wood,  and  canvas,  every  particle 
of  which  has  been  brought  out  from  Enirland,  and  has 
been  carried  up  on  wagons  from  the  sea.  The  streets  are 
axle  deep  in  what  is  either  mud  or  dust  according  to  the 
Eeaeon.  The  inhabitants,  who  are  of  all  nations  and  colors, 
muster  at  the  present  time  between  twenty  and  thirty 
thousand,  and  may  be  described  as  the  Bohemians  of  the 
four  continents.  By  Bohemian  I  do  not  mean  to  be  un- 
complimentary. I  mean  merely  a  class  of  persons  who 
prefer  adventure  and  speculation  to  settled  industry,  and 
who  do  not  work  well  in  the  harness  of  ordinary  life. 
Here  are  diggers  from  America  and  Australia,  German 
speculators,  Fenian  head-centres,  traders,  saloon-keepers, 
professional  gamblers,  l)arristers  (I  heard  one  of  these  say 
it  was  a  lawyer's  Eldorado),  ex-officers  of  the  army  and 
navy,  younger  sons  of  good  fann'ly,  who  have  not  taken 
to  a  profespion  or  have  Ixjen  obliged  to  leave  it.  A  mar- 
vellous motley  assemblage,  among  whom  money  flo.\s 


218  SKETCHKS    FRONT    J.    A.   FROUDK, 

like  water  from  the  amazing  productiveness  of  the  mine  ; 
and  in  the  midst  of  tlieni  a  hundred  or  so  keen  eyed 
Jewish  merchants,  who  have  gatliered  like  eagles  over 
their  prey,  and  a  few  thousand  natives  who  have  come  to 
work  for  wages,  to  steal  diamonds,  and  to  lay  their  earn- 
ings out  in  rifles  and  powder. 

There  are  three  pits  out  of  which  the  diamonds  are 
taken.  One  of  them,  two  miles  off,  is  comparatively  un- 
productive ;  one  better,  hut  still  negligently  worked  ;  the 
third  is  the  famous  Koppe,  about  which  the  town  has 
formed  itself.  Tliis  Koppe  was  once  a  rounded  hillock, 
swelling  out  of  the  plain  and  covered  with  mimosa  trees, 
under  the  shade  of  which  passing  wagons  stopjjed  to  rest. 
Eyes  negligently  looking  round  one  day  saw  something 
shining  in  the  grass  ;  a  tuft  was  pulled  up,  and  more 
sparks  were  seen  about  the  roots.  Digging  began,  and 
it  was  discovered  that  through  the  level  shale  which 
forms  the  ordinary  surface  an  oval  hole  had  been  cut,  as 
if  by  some  elliptical  boring  tool,  working  with  singular 
evenness.  The  lengtli  of  the  opening  is  about  1200 
feet,  the  breadth,  900,  the  sides  perpendicular  ;  the 
depth  unknown,  for  they  are  afraid  to  bore.  A  discovery 
that  the  bottom  is  near  would  destroy  the  value  of  the 
property.  A  discovery  that  there  is  no  bottom  would 
convulse  the  diamond  market.  At  j)resent  they  have  cut 
down  about  120  feet. 

Four  or  five  thousand  blacks  are  picking  into  the  blue 
crumbling  substance,  neither  clay  nor  stone,  in  which 
the  diamonds  are  imbedded.  The  area  is  divided  into 
claims,  or  quadrilateral  sections,  thirty  feet  by  twenty, 
"which  are  held  as  freeholds,  and  again  are  subdivided 
into  half  and  quarter  claims.  Each  owner  works  by 
himself  or  with  his  own  servants.  lie  has  his  own  wnre 
rrn^Q,  and  his  own  basket,  by  which  he  sends  his  stuff  to 


SOUTIT    AFRICAN    NOTES.  219 

the  surface  to  be  washed.  The  rim  of  tlie  pit  is  fringed 
with  windlasses.  The  descending  wire-ropes  stretch 
from  them  thick  as  gossamers  on  an  autnmn  meadow. 
The  system  is  as  demorahzing  as  it  is  ruinous.  The 
owner  cannot  be  ubiquitous  :  if  he  is  with  his  washing- 
cradle,  his  servants  in  the  pit  steal  his  most  valuable 
stdnes  and  secrete  them.  Forty  per  cent  of  the  dia- 
monds discovered  are  supposed  to  be  lost  in  this  way. 
The  sides  fall  in  from  the  strain  of  so  much  weight  on  the 
brink.  A  company  working  the  mine  systematically 
with  a  couple  of  steam-engines  could  produce  the  same 
results  with  a  tenth  of  the  labor,  and  so  obviously  is  the 
interest  of  the  claim-owners  in  making  the  change,  that 
if  <left  to  themselves  they  would  form  into  a  company  to- 
morrow. The  Government,  however,  forbids  it  ;  for 
the  natural  reason  that  the  vagabond  population  would 
disappear,  the  army  of  gand)lers,  keepers  of  saloons  and 
drink-shops  ;  a  single  magistrate  would  then  suffice  for 
peace  and  order,  and  the  Governor  and  his  staff  and  the 
£100,000  a  year  which  is  now  raised  and  spent  out  of  the 
produce  of  the  pit  would  disappear  together. 

The  Governor  himself,  Mr.  Southey,  is  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  men  in  South  Africa.  He  won  his 
spurs  in  the  Kafir  war  of  1834.  He  was  with  Sir  Harry 
Smith  when  Hintza,  the  Kafir  chief,  was  killed,  and  he 
80  much  recommended  himself  that  lie  rose  fast  in  the 
public  service.  He  was  for  many  years  Colonial 
Secretary,  and  held  that  office  when,  in  opposition  to  his 
protests,  responsible  government  was  thrust  upon  the 
colony.  He  could  not  believe  that  it  would  work  suc- 
cessfully. His  desire  was  and  is  to  see  South  Africa 
British  up  to  the  Zambesi  T?iver,  the  lative  chiefs  taken 
everywhere  under  the  l>ritish  flag,  and  the  whole  country 
governed  by  the  Crown.     When  the    Diamond  Fields 


2'-?0  SKETCHES    FI10:\[   J.    A.    FROUDE. 

were  annexed  as  a  Crown  colon)',  lie  accepted  the  p^overn- 
orsliip,  witli  a  hope  that,  nortli  of  tlie  Orange  River,  he 
inight  carry  ont  liis  own  policy,  check  the  encroachments 
of  tlie  Transvaal  Republic,  and  extend  the  empire  inter- 
nally. 

It  has  been  the  one  mistake  of  Mr.  Southey's  life. 
Being  without  a  force  of  any  kind,  he  could  only  control 
the  republics  by  the  lielp  of  the  native  chiefs,  and  the 
coercion  of  the  republics  in  any  way  became  impossible 
from  the  moment  that  the  control  of  the  Cape  Colony 
was  passed  over  to  its  own  people.  Otherwise  I  have 
rarely  met  a  man  whom  I  have  more  admired.  Mr. 
Southey  is  over  seventy.  lie  drove  me  one  day  seventy 
miles  in  a  cart  with  as  wild  a  team  as  1  ever  sat  behind, 
and  he  went  to  a  party  in  the  evening.  I  said  to  myself 
as  I  looked  at  him,  "  If  some  one  came  in  and  told  yon 
that  you  were  to  be  taken  out  and  shot  in  five  minutes, 
you  would  finish  what  you  were  about  with  perfect  de- 
liberation, and  not  a  muscle  of  your  face  would  alter." 

Bloemfonteine^  December  6. — After  a  week  at  the 
Diamond  Fields,  I  started  again  in  the  mail-cart  for  this 
place.  The  distance  is  but  ninety  miles.  The  roads,  I 
was  told,  were  good,  and  that  we  should  do  it  in  a  single 
day.  Alas  !  between  the  Diamond  Fields  and  Bloera- 
fonteine  lies  the  Modder  or  Mud  River,  fitly  so  named, 
especially  if  it  be  in  flood,  as  it  was  when  we  came  up  to 
it.  Dense  volumes  of  turbid  filth  were  rollinsi:  alonff  at 
the  level  of  the  banks,  and  the  passage  seemed  impos- 
sible. We  spent  the  night  at  a  shanty.  In  the  morning 
the  water  did  not  seem  to  have  fallen.  ''  It  was  stark," 
the  driver  said,  but  he  had  seen  it  worse,  and  we  must 
go  any  way.  He  took  us  three  miles  higher  up,  to  a 
place  where  he  said  the  river  was  broader  and  not  so 
deep.     Passing  through  the  fi'inge  of  bush  we  had  the 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    JfOTES.  231 

Modder  again  before  iis,  jierhaps  200  yards  wide.  The 
bank  on  which  we  stood  was  twenty-five  feet  above  the 
river,  with  a  steep  track  cut  through  it,  down  which  the 
carts  could  go.  The  horses  were  taken  out,  as  they 
.cannot  be  trusted  to  draw  steadily  in  deep  water,  and 
they  are  once  plunged  in  and  struggled  across  half  swini- 
^jipng.  A  dozen  heavy  oxen  then  appeared  on  the  op- 
posite side,  led  l)y  Kafirs,  who  were  to  come  over  and 
^Ifo  charge  of  us.  The  stream  was  violent.  The 
Jvufirs  were  up  to  their  necks,  and  sometimes  slipped  and 
rolled  under.  The  oxen  and  they  reached  us  undrowned, 
however,  and  were  "  inspanned  "  to  our  cart.  We  put 
our  boxes  on  the  seats,  and  ourselves  climbed  to  the  top 
of  them,  and  commended  ourselves  to  Providence.  The 
slide  down  the  bank  was  the  first  and  worst  danger,  for 
the  pole  was"  crazy,  and  bent  and  twisted  as  the  weight 
fell  upon  it.  It  held,  however,  and  in  we  went,  and  with 
the  driver  swearino;,  the  Kafirs  veiling:,  and  the  water 
pouring  through  the  cart  within  an  inch  of  the  seats,  wc 
scrambled  across  somehow,  and  found  brandy  and  hot 
coffee  ready,  prepared  for  us  in  case  wc  had  met  with  a 
misadventure. 

Without  further  misfortuue  avc  arrived  at  Bloemfon- 
teine,  a  pretty  town  4500  feet  above  the  sea,  clustered 
round  the  foot  of  the  old  British  fort  on  which  the 
Free  State  flag  is  now  flying.  It  is  now  the  Dutch  cap- 
ital, the  stronghold  of  Dutch  politics  and  Dutch  religion, 
tlie  central  object  of  the  pride  and  hope  of  Dutch  na- 
tionalitv. 

For  some  reason  unknown  to  me,  Bloemfonteine  has 
been  selected  also  as  a  special  scene  of  missionary  exer- 
tion by  the  extreme  High  Church  party  in  England. 
There  is  a  bishop  here  whose  vestments  would  look  gor- 
geous on  a  rrreck  archimandrite,  there  is  an  Anglo-Cath 


222  SKETCHES   FROM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

olic  nnnnorv,  in  the  neighborhood  there  is  a  college  of 
Anglo-Catlioh'e  iiioTiks,  and  attached  to  the  nunnery  an 
excellent  girls'  school,  of  which  the  Dutch  themselves 
apeak  in  terms  of  high  admiration. 

The  day  after  my  arrival  was  Sunday.  I  went  to  the 
cathedral,  when  the  bishop  preached.  Being  in  a  re- 
public, he  had  caught  something  of  its  spirit.  He  told  us 
that  we  lived  in  days  of  democracy,  when  the  principle 
of  loyalty  had  no  longer  any  earthly  object  to  which  it 
could  attach  itself.  But  every  natural  principle  must 
have  some  object,  and  loyalty  would  therefore  instinc- 
tively turn  to  Christ,  and  to  the  Bishop.  I  thought  the 
anticipation  rather  sanguine.  But  the  Bishop  is  an  ac- 
complished and  even  superior  person.  I  dined  with  him 
afterward,  and  heard  much  that  interested  me  on  the 
state  of  the  country.  He  tells  me  that  the  price  of  every- 
thing is  five  times  what  it  was  before  the  diamond  dis- 
covery. Living  is  three  times  as  expensive  as  in  Eng- 
land. The  country  is  flooded  with  money  ;  but  with 
butter  at  seven  shillings  a  pound,  and  milk  a  shilling  a 
pint — the  present  prices  in  Bloemfonteine  market — no 
one  is  much  the  better  for  it.  The  English  trade  and 
speculate,  but  do  not  care  to  cultivate  the  soil.  The 
Dutch  grow  what  they  require  for  their  own  households, 
but  l)eing  indifferent  abont  money  they  will  not  go  out  of 
their  way  to  raise  supplies  for  others  ;  and  yet  we  are 
told  that  the  Diamond  Fields  have  saved  the  country. 
Politically,  socially,  and  economically  they  appear  to  me 
to  have  been  a  mere  nuisance. 

Friday^  Decemher  13.  —  We  started  yesterday  in  a  cart 
Avith  four  horses  for  Trabancho.  It  is  thirty-five  miles 
off,  the  mountain  beinfj-  clearly  visible  from  Bloem- 
fonteine. 

The  drive  was  of  the  usual  kind.     It  is  hot  summer, 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    N"OTES.  223 

the  rain  has  stopped  for  a  while,  and  the  mud  in  the 
roads  is  baked  as  liard  as  brick.  We  had  again  to  cross 
the  Modder  River.  The  leaders  bolted  as  we  were 
going  down  into  it,  and  we  were  swinging  for  a  moment 
^.-  over  the  edge  of  a  precipice.  As  we  scrambled  up  the 
other  side  the    wheelers  jibbed  ;  we  were  saved  from 

;^;**ii-olling  back  into  the  water  only  by  the  depth  of  the  clay 

in  which  the  wheels  were  buried.     These  adventures  pass 

•for  nothing  in  South  Africa.     The  Bishop's  archdeacon 

'  "was  upset  in  a  river  a  week  ago,  and  lost  his  cope  and 
chasuble. 

At  four  o'clock  we  reached  our  destination,  and  drove 
to  the  Wesleyan  Missionary  Station,  a  long  straggling 
^louse  with  a  chapel  and  school-room  attached.  Across 
a  ravine  stands  the  new  Anglican  monastery.  Between 
the  station"*and  the  monks  there  is  little  or  no  communica- 
tion. It  was  a  lovely  summer  evening,  and  the  mission- 
ary and  his  family  being  out,  we  strolled  up  to  call  on 
the  King.  In  the  South  African  towns  generally  the 
natives  are  relegated  to  the  suburbs.  At  Trabancho  the 
King  and  his  court  have  the  post  of  honor.  The  white 
traders  and  clergy  are  in  the  back  premises.  The  city  is 
composed  of  about  1500  beehive  huts,  thatched  with 
reeds,  each  surrounded  with  a  stone  wall.  Swarms  of 
cliildren  were  playing  in  the  sunshine,  necklaces  of  beads 
being  their  chief  or  only  covering,  and  the  little 
stomachs  blown  out  till  they  shone,  with  mealies  or 
buckwheat  porridge.  A  flagstaff  denoted  the  royal 
residence.  We  made  for  it,  and  presently  the  eldest  of 
the  princes  came  out,  a  middle-aged  thick-set  miin, 
dressed  in  a  Methodist  parson's  cast-off  suit  of  clothes, 
followed  by  other  chiefs  in  skins.  We  shook  hands,  and 
immediately  after  the  old  King  himself  came  up,  hand- 
somely dressed  in  leopard-skins,  and  walking  slowly  with 


23-t  SKETCHES    ntOM    J.    A.   I'UOUDE. 

a  knob-stick.  Chairs  were  placed  for  the  King  and  tlie 
visitors.  The  Prime  Minister  .nnd  tlie  court  jester  sat 
on  the  ground  on  each  side  of  his  Majesty,  and  a  circle 
of  thirty  or  forty  of  the  princij)al  people  squatted  round, 
some  of  the  youngsters  wearing  military  caps.  All  were 
covered  more  or  less,  and  had  at  least  a  blanket. 

The  King  asked  after  the  Queen,  w^hom  he  professed 
to  hold  in  high  respect,  and  then  made  some  minute  in- 
quiries into  the  Diamond  Field  business.  Having  satis- 
lied  his  curiosity,  I  asked  him  if  he  had  heard  of  the 
Langabalele  affair.  He  looked  surprised,  affected  igno- 
rance, and  appealed  to  his  minister.  The  minister 
seemed  to  know  no  more  than  he.  I  discovered  after- 
ward that  they  had  been  watching  the  whole  business 
with  the  intensest  interest.  At  that  moment  a  party 
from  Langabalele's  tribe  were  in  Trabancho,  and  were 
probably  in  the  suite  listening  to  the  conversation. 

Two  of  the  princes  are  Christians,  and  are  anxious  for 
their  father's  conversion.  But  he  sticks  to  his  heathen- 
ism. "  My  sons,"  he  said,  "  want  me  to  be  baptized. 
I  say  to  them.  Christians  here,"  pointing  to  the  Wes- 
leyan  Station,  "  and  Christians  there,"  pointing  to  the 
Anglican  monks.  "  Christians  there  won't  speak  to 
Christians  here.  When  one  of  tliem  has  converted  the 
other,  it  will  be  time  to  come  to  me." 

Trabancho  is  maintained  by  the  Free  State,  partly  to 
show  the  world  how  good  a  Dutch  state  can  be  to  the 
natives,  and  partly  as  a  nursery  for  laborers  ;  but  it  was 
not  a  pretty  sight  to  me.  Food  of  course  has  to  be  sup- 
plied for  so  many  people,  and  a  certain  quantity  of 
ground  is  cultivated  ;  but  the  w^ork  here  as  elsewhere  is 
almost  wholly  done  by  the  women.  The  men  are  not 
allowed  to  fight,  and  fighting  being  the  only  labor  they 
understand,  they  are  hopelessly  idle. 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  225 

When  we  returned  to  the  station  the  missionary  had 
come  in.  He  entertained  ns  to  the  hest  of  his  abihty. 
He  gave  us  a  supper,  wliich,  if  phiin,  was  abundant. 
Hunger  was  the  best  of  sauces,  and  his  conversation  was 

---instructive  if  not  amusing.     To  lodge  us  was  tlie  chief 
difficulty.     There  was  one  spare  bed,  and  there  was  a 

•^}fibfa  in  the  sitting-room.  The  Chief  Justice  and  the 
Secretary  of  State  took  the  bed  and  gave  the  sofa  to  me. 

/My  mind  misgave  me.     I   remembered  my  experience 

^with  a  sofa  at  the  Yaal  River.  There  were  neither 
matches  nor  candles,  so  I  prudently  did  not  extinguish 
the  lamp  when  I  lay  down.      Five  minutes  were  all  that 

.  I  could  bear.  I  bounded  back  into  my  clothes,  turned 
tip  the  lamp  again,  and  settled  into  a  chair.  What  was 
I  to  do  ?  £)n  the  table  lay  a  history  of  Methodism  in 
seven  volumes,  a  commentary  on  St.  Paul  in  five  vol- 
umes. Happily  on  a  distant  shelf,  concealed  modestly 
behind  a  curtain,  I  discovered  a  pile  of  novels,  and  read 
myself  to  sleep  with  "  Modern  Accomplishments." 

I  have  now  learned  as  much  as  I  am  likely  to  learn, 
and  may  make  my  way  back  to  Port  Elizabeth.  I  am 
tired  of  knocking  about.  I  have  still  500  miles  of  Cape 
roads  before  me.  Tlie  rivers  in  the  colony  are  reported 
to   be   in   flood,  and  the   bridges   to   be   broken.     Mr. 

H ,   an  exceptionally  agreeable  English  gentleman, 

Avlio  is  here,  undertakes  to  drive  me  in  his  cart  to  Faure- 
smith,  seventy-two  miles  of  the  way.  There  I  shall  fall 
in  with  "  Cobb's  coach"  from  Kimberley  to  Algoa  Bay. 
1  have  tried  to  point  out  to  people  here  how  absurd  it  is 
for  them  to  talk  of  South  African  independence.  In 
the  towns  tiiey  import  everything  which  they  consume. 
They  import  their  flonr  ;  they  import  Australian  incat  ; 
they  import  milk,  butter,  tinned  vegetables  ;  they  ini- 
]K>rt  their  furnitun;,   their  clnrlics,   and  even  tind)er  to 


2ii6  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

floor  and  roof  their  houses.  They  manufacture  nothing 
except  wagons  and  harness.  They  are  dependent  on 
Europe  for  their  commonest  necessaries  of  life.  Tliey 
produce,  to  buy  tliese  things,  wool,  diamonds,  gold,  cop- 
per, and  ostrich  feathers.  But  they  cannot  live  on 
these.  Three  frigates  could  close  their  harbors,  and 
they  would  be  at  once  upon  their  knees. 

We  saw  a  curious  sight  on  the  way  :  a  locust  swarm, 
a  great  brown  cloud  sweeping  through  the  air,  pursued 
by  an  army  of  locust-birds,  large  flycatchers,  like  swal- 
lows, but  twice  the  size.  These  birds  sweep  up  and 
down  the  swarm  clipping  off  the  wings  of  the  locusts, 
which  then  fall  like  rain  to  the  ground,  when  the  birds 
alight  and  devour  them  at  leisure.  There  are  all  the 
plagues  of  Egypt  in  this  country  except  one.  The  flies 
blacken  your  breakfast  table.  The  frogs  have  given  me 
many  a  sleepless  night.  Lice  there  are  none,  but  change 
the  translation  slightly,  and  you  are  provided  to  your 
skin's  discontent.  The  locusts  desolate  the  fields  and 
gardens.  The  hail  is  so  violent  that  in  Katal  and  the 
Transvaal  it  will  pierce  holes  through  roofs  of  corrugated 
iron.  Under  a  thunder-cloud  there  is  the  darkness  of 
midnight.  Red-water  and  horse-sickness  are  an  equiva- 
lent for  murrain,  and  if  the  rivers  are  not  turned  to 
blood,  they  come  down  after  rain  with  the  consistency 
of  red  soup. 

Colesberg,  Decemher  19. — -Again  in  the  Cape  Colony. 
Cobb's  coach  hanging  fire,  and  there  being  some  doubt 
whether  any  coach  would  run  again  till  the  floods  had 
gone  down,  I  found  a  friend  to  drive  me  to  the  Orange 
River.  At  the  passage  I  was  told  that  I  should  find  a 
ferry  and  a  carriage  which  would  take  me  on  to  Coles- 
berg.  The  Orange  River,  though  it  has  still  800  miles 
to   run,    is   even  here   an  impressive    stream — 600    feet 


SOUTH   AFRICAN    NOTES.  227 

across,  deep  and  rapid.  The  ferryman,  a  Dutchman, 
and  tlierefore  never  in  a  hurry,  was  slowly  transporting 
vast  droves  of  oxen  to  the  colonial  border.  Would  he 
send  me  over  ?     He  would.     He  would  not.     He  did 

'not  know.  "Why  could  I  not  go  by  tlie  mail-cart  ?  It 
was  then  noon.     He  promised  me  an  answer  at  three. 

■^rsat  down  with  a  cigar  and  a  drawing-book.  Three 
hours  passed.  I  again  applied,  and  again  found  myself 
treated  with  phlegmatic    indifference.      The  alternative 

'before  me  was  to  sleep  supperless  on  the  sands.  I  said 
nothing,  lighted  another  cigar,  reseated  myself,  and 
sketched  on.     He  approved  of  my  composure,  relented, 

'and  told  me  I  should  go.     There  M^as  really  not  the 

:  elightest  difficulty.  There  was  a  carriage  with  a  pair  of 
horses  on  the  other  side,  which  was  ready  in  a  few 
minutes,  and  in  two  hours  I  was  again  in  a  British  colo- 
nial town.  The  best  hotel  is  full.  1  have  to  take  up 
witli  a  place  kept  by  a  drunken  lout  from  High  Wick- 
ham,  wliose  wife,  however,  has  sense  and  cleanliness. 
The  l)ad  specimens  of  colonists  copy  the  Kafirs,  and 
leave  their  wives  to  work  while  they  drink  and  sleep. 
This  poor  woman  slaves  to  keep  things  straight,  but  with 
imperfect  success.  The  diamonds,  she  says,  have  turned 
everybody's  head.  There  is  more  money,  but  living  is 
ruinously  expensive,  and  no  one  is  the  better  for  it. 

I  passed  a  farm  on  my  way  here  which  was  a  model 
in  its  way.  Tlie  owner  was  an  Englishman,  and  when 
an  Englishman  will  work  at  agriculture,  he  shows  the 
Dntchman  how  to  do  it. 

Colesberg  itself  lies  in  a  rocky  valley,  more  than  4000 
feet  above  the  sea,  and  is  geologically  the  strangest  place 
I  ever  saw.  A  huge  flat-topped  mountain  rises  over  it, 
formed  of  alternate  layers  of  stratified  rock  and  iron- 
stone, the  horizontal  beds  norfectly  even,  as  if  they  had 


228  SKETCKES    PROM    J.   A.   FKOUDE. 

never  been  disturbedj   yet  beds  of  igneous  rock,  many 
hundred  feet  thick,  lying  on  tlie  top  of  them. 

New  Bedford,  December  2i. — We  are  descending 
from  the  liighlands  at  last,  and  are  again  among  the  jessa- 
mines and  the  orange-trees.  Five  days  ago  I  left  Coles- 
berg  with  a  cart  and  pair  of  horses  to  make  my  way 
down  the  colon V,  and  I  have  travelled  at  the  rate  of  about 
fifty  miles  a  day.  The  first  evening  after  sunset  I  passed 
a  handsome  house  belonging  to  a  Dutchman.  lie  was 
sitting  in  the  twilight  outside  his  door  with  his  wife,  a 
middle-ao-ed  laclv,  but  still  handsome,  and  with  beautiful 
eyes.  1  stopped  to  give  the  horses  some  water.  We 
fell  into  conversation.  I  asked  for  fresh  milk.  They 
sent  a  boy  to  the  stable  with  a  tumbler  to  milk  the  cow 
for  me.  The}"  invited  me  to  stay  there  for  the  night, 
with  a  courtesy  and  repose  of  manner  which  no  English 
lord  and  lady  could  have  outdone.  The  Dutch  having 
been  long  settled  in  the  country  have  a  dignity  about 
them  which  contrasts  favorably  with  Anglo-colonial 
smartness.  I  regretted  to  leave  them,  but  it  was  moon- 
light, and  we  pushed  on.  The  roads,  which  are  bad 
enough  by  day,  are  horrible  at  night.  They  are  mere 
wheeltracks,  the  ruts  a  foot  or  two  deep,  and  the  baked 
clay  through  whicli  tliey  are  cut  now  as  hard  as  stone. 
The  road  commissioners  are  the  country  farmers.  I  said 
to  some  one  that  I  met  on  the  way,  that  1  supposed  the 
Dutch  rarely  left  their  homes,  and  so  did  not  care.  I 
was  told  that  if  I  could  choose  a  road  that  led  to  a  church 
I  should  always  find  it  good.  The  farmers  will  go  with 
their  families  fifty  miles  to  a  church,  and  never  miss  a 
church  festival.  The  ministers  are  better  paid  than 
average  state  officials,  and  the  Dutch  meeting-houses  are 
the  handsomest  ])nildino-s  in  South  Africa.  I  saw,  in 
passing  through  Cradock,    a  church  which  would  have 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    NOTES.  220 

been  called  fine  anywhere  in  Europe.  The  Dutch  farm- 
ers of  the  neighborhood  had  built  it  entirelv.  The  news 
about  the  floods  is  too  true.  Although  it  is  summer 
there  has  been  a  heavy  fall  of  snow  on  the  mountains. 
It  has  melted  suddenly.  Violent  rain  falling  at  the  same 
.  time  has   burst   simultaneously    a    number   of  ill-made 

, '"Reservoirs,  and  the  Great  Fish  River  has  risen  to  forty 
'  feet  above  its  natural  level.     The  banks  are    wooded. 
/The  torrent  rushing  over  them  tears  out  the  trees  by  the 

^  >oots,  and  the  river  rolls  along,  carrying  with  it  enormous 
masses  of  floating  timber.  No  imaginable  bridge  can 
stand  such  a  strain,  and  it  is  a  serious  problem  how  the 
railways  are  by  and  by  to  be  carried  over  these  rivers. 

'  yA  druggist  at  Cradock,  whose  son  is  at  a  Scotch  univer- 
'  sity,  kindly  took  charge  of  me  as  an  ex-Lord  Rector. 
He  placed*"  me  in  the  hands  of  an  experienced  young 
Dutchman  who  knew  the  points  where  the  Fish  River 
could  be  crossed,  and,  after  less  serious  difficulties  than 
befell  me  at  the  Modder,  I  am  now  within  120  miles  of 
Port  Elizabeth.  New  Bedford  is  one  of  the  prettiest 
towns  which  T  have  seen,  nestled  among  densely  wooded 
mountains,  and  luxurious  with  the  wild  variety  of  sub- 
tropical vegetation.  Half  a  mile  distant,  among  orange 
groves,  and  approached  through  vast  oak  avenues,  lie 
the  remains  of  the  ruined  house  of  Sir  Andrew  Stocken- 
strom,  who  was  so  honorably  distinguished  in  the  last 
generation  by  his  endeavors  to  protect  and  raise  the 
native  tribes  on  the  borders.  The  house  was  burned  in 
one  of  the  Kaflr  wars,  and  has  not  been  restored.  The 
trees  which  were  planted  round  it  would  be  splendid 
even  in  an  English  park.  All  else  is  desolate.  AVild 
jessamines  creep  among  the  broken  casements.  A  dis- 
mounted cannon  of  the  last  century,  with  a  Dutch  in- 
scription, lies  half-buried  under  leaves,  and  as  a  practi- 


230  SKETCHES    FROM    J.    A.    FROUDE. 

cal  coimnent  on  tlic  owiior's  cliivalrou.s  efforts  to  elevate 
tlie  Kafir  race  by  mere  benevolence,  the  town  to-daj  is 
full  of  black  creatures  of  both  sexes  and  all  ages,  who 
have  come  in  to  drink,  and  are  lying  about  in  the  sun 
idle  and  raasterless. 

Tunhridge,   Decemher  26. — Only    thirty  miles    left. 
Saw  the  sea  to-day  from  the  final  ridge  over  which  we 
crossed,   and,  after  my  long   battering  journey,  I  cried 
out  like  the  vanguard  of  the  ten  thousand  when  they 
looked  down  on  Trebizond.      For  the  last  two  days  we 
have    been     descending   through    picturesque    ravines, 
studded  with  the  African   aloe.     The  open  hills  blaze 
with  mesembryanthemums.     The  ivy-leaf  geranium  runs 
like  a  creeper  up  the  stems  of  the  trees  on  the  river- 
sides, and  pours  its  flowers  in  cascades  over  the  branches. 
The  banks  of  the  streams  are  fringed  with  the  fronds  of 
giant  ferns.     This  afternoon  we  took  our  last  leap,  1200 
feet,  down  into  the  plain,  through  winding  glens,  once 
the  scenes  of  our  most  desperate  battles  with  the  Kafirs, 
now  warm  and  glowing  in  the  soft  light  of  a  summer 
sunset,  fragrant  with  the  million  blossoms  of  the  wild 
Cape  jessamine,  and  with  no  more  formidable  animals 
concealed   among   the    thickets    than    armies    of   gray 
baboons,  which  were  playing  on  the  grassy  lawns  that 
opened  in  the  intervals  of  the  forest.     One  \ery  large 
fellow,  with  white  whiskers  and  sharp  twinkling  eyes, 
stood  half  hidden  in  a  bush  to  watch  us  as  we  passed. 
My  negro  driver,  silent  and  solemn  hitherto,  burst  into 
shouts  of  delight  at  the  sight  of  his  relation.      1  begged 
him  to  be  silent,  that  I  might  get  a  nearer  view,  but  he 
understood  the  matter  better  than  I  did.     He  addressed 
Jock,  as  he  called  him,  in  terms  of  affectionate  greeting. 
Jock  chattered,  slipped  round  the  bush,  and  waved  his 
paw.     I  had  just  seen  worse  manners  at  the  last  hotel 


SOUTH    AFRICAN    KOTES.  231 

which  I  had  passed,  where  the  innkeeper  boasted  to  me 
that,  when  the  late  Governor,  Sir  Philip  Wodehouse, 
called  thei'e  he  had  made  Sir  Philip  know  that  he,  in  his 
own  house,  was  as  good  a  governor  as  the  other.  A  free 
Africander  was  not  going  to  humble  himself  before  the 
.best  Excellency  that  could  be  sent  from  England. 
,."1  Tunbridge^  Sunday  Evening,  December  27. — The  last 
'day  of  rhy  singular  journey.  I  have  travelled  1500 
Biiles  on  the  roughest  roads  that  I  have  ever  been  jolted 
^  o-ver,  amid  thunder-storms  and  hard  living  and  nights 
without  sleep.  Had  I  been  thirty,  it  would  have  been 
the  most  delightful  of  adventures.  When  one  is  near 
sixty,  adventures  cease  to  be  exhilarating.  When  I  was 
Reaving  Maritzburg,  plunging  into  the  heart  of  an  un- 
known wilderness,  I  thought  of  Faust  descending  to 
"  the  MotlTcrs"  and  Mephistopheles's 

"  Ich  bin  neugierig  wenn  er  wiederkommt." 

I  am  a  stone  lighter  than  when  I  was  last  at  Port  Ehza- 
beth.  In  a  Potclieffstrom  newspaper  I  saw  myself  de- 
scribed as  "  a  lean  gray  old  gentleman,"  but  I  am  strong 
and  well,  and  none  the  worse  for  what  I  have  gone 
through. 


YIII. 
A  DAY'S  FISHING  AT  CHENEYS.* 

The  village  stands  on  a  chalk-liill  rising  from  the  little 
River  dies,  four  miles  from  Ricknianswoi-tli,  on  tlie  road 
to  Amersliam.     The  estate  belongs  to  the  Duke  of  Bed- 
ford, and  is  pervaded  by  an  aspect  of  serene  good  man- 
ners, as  if  it  was  always  Sunday.     Ko  vulgar  noises  dis- 
turb the  general  quiet.     Cricket  may  be  played  there, 
and  b.owls  and  such  games  as  propriety  allows  ;  but  the 
oldest  inhabitant  can  never  have  heard  an  oath  spoken 
aloud,  or  seen  a  drunken  man.     Dirt  and  poverty  are 
equally  unknown.     The  houses,  large  and  small,  are  solid 
and  substantial,  built  of  red  brick,  with  high  chimneys 
and  pointed  gables,  and  well  trimmed  gardens  before  the 
doors.     A  Gothic  fountain  stands  in  the  middle  of  the 
village  green,  under  a  cluster  of  tall  elms,  where  pict- 
uresque, neatly  dressed    girls  go  for  the  purest  water. 
Beyond  the  green  a  road  runs,  on  one  side  of  which 
stands  the  church  and  the  parsonage,    on  the  other  the 
remains  of  the  once  spacious  manor  house,  which  was 
built  by  the  first  Earl  of  Bedford,  on  the  site  of  an  old 
castle  of  the  Plantagenet  kings.     One  wing  of  the  manor 
house  only  survives,   but  so  well  constructed,    and  of 
material  so  admirable,  that  it  looks  as  if  it  had  been  com- 

*  Tliis    sketch    contains  the    descriptive  part  of  the  Author's 
Eesay  on  "  Cheneys  and  the  House  of  Russell." 


A    day's    fishing    at    CHENLiYS.  233 

pleted  yesterday.  In  a  Held  under  the  window  is  an  oak 
which  tradition  says  was  planted  by  Queen  Bess.  More 
probably  it  is  as  old  as  the  Conquest.  The  entire  spot, 
church,  mansion,  cottages,  and  people,  form  a  piece  of 
ancient  England  artificially  preserved  from  the  intrusion 
ctf  'modern  ways.  No  land  is  let  on  building  lease  in 
Gifeneys  to  be  disfigured  by  contractors'  villas.  No  flar- 
ing shops,  which  such  villas  bring  behind  them,  make 
th6  street  hideous.  A  single  miscellaneous  store  supplies 
the"  simple  wants  of  the  few  inhabitants — the  bars  of 
soap,  the  bunches  of  dip  candles,  the  tobacco  in  ounce 
packets,  the  tea,  cofliee,  and  sugar,  the  balls  of  twine, 
the  strips  of  calico.  Even  the  bull's-eyes  and  ginger- 
bread for  the  children  are  not  unpermitted,  if  they  are 
honestly  made  and  warranted  not  to  be  poisonous.  So 
light  is  the  business  that  the  tidy  woman  who  presides  at 
the  counter  combines  with  it  the  duties  of  the  post- office, 
which  again  are  of  the  simplest  kind.  All  is  old-fash- 
ioned, grave,  and  respectable.  No  signs  are  to  be  found 
of  competition,  of  the  march  of  intellect,  of  emancipa- 
tion, of  the  divine  right  of  each  man  and  woman  to  do 
what  is  good  in  their  own  eyes — of  the  blessed  liberty 
which  the  House  of  Russell  has  been  so  busy  in  setting 
forward.  The  inhabitants  f)f  Cheneys  live  under  au- 
thority. The  voice  of  the  Russells  has  been  the  voice 
of  the  emancipator — the  hand  has  been  the  hand  of  the 
ruling  noljle. 

The  Manor  House  contains  nothing  of  mucli  interest. 
In  itself,  though  a  fragment,  it  is  a  fine  specimen  of  the 
mason  work  of  the  Tudor  times,  and  if  not  pulled  down 
will  be  standing  strong  as  ever  when  the  new  London 
squares  are  turned  to  dust  heaps.  With  its  high-pitch- 
ed roofs  and  its  clusters  of  curiously  twisted  chimneys  it 
has  served  as  a  model  for  the  architecture  of  the  village. 


^3-±  SKETCHES    FKOM    J.   A.   FllOUDE, 

the  smallest  cottages  looking  as  if  tliey  bad  grown  from 
seeds  which  had  been  dropped  by  the  central  mansion. 

All  this  is  pretty  enough,  but  the  attraction  of  the 
place  t©  a  stranger  is  the  church  and  what  it  contains. 
I  had  visited  it  before  more  than  once,  but  I  wished  to 
inspect  the  monuments  more  closely.  I  ran  dowm  from 
London,  one  evening  in  June,  to  the  village  inn,  and  in 
the  morning,  soon  after  sunrise,  when  1  was  in  less  dan- 
ger of  having  the  officious  assistance  thrust  upon  me  of 
clerk  or  sexton,  I  sauntered  over  to  see  if  1  could  enter. 
The  keys  were  kept  at  an  adjoining  cottage.  The  busy 
matron  was  already  up  and  at  her  work.  When  I  told 
her  that  I  had  special  permission,  she  unlocked  the 
church  door  and  left  me  to  myself.  Within,  as  without, 
all  was  order.  No  churchwardens,  it  was  plain  enough, 
had  ever  been  allowed  to  work  their  will  at  Cheneys. 
Nay,  the  unchallenged  loyalty  of  the  Bedford  family  to 
constitutional  liberty  must  have  saved  the  church  from 
the  visits  of  the  Cominissi oners  of  the  Long  Parliament. 
On  the  walls  are  old  Catholic  brasses,  one  representing  a 
parish  priest  of  the  place  with  the  date  of  1512,  and  a 
scroll  praying  for  mercy  on  his  soul.  Strange  to  think 
that  this  man  had  said  mass  in  the  very  place  where  I 
was  standing,  and  that  the  memory  of  him  had  been  pre- 
served by  the  Russells,  till  the  wheel  had  come  round 
again  and  a  Catholic  hierarchy  had  been  again  established 
in  England,  with  its  Cardinals  and  Archbishops  and 
Bishops.  Will  mass  be  ever  said  in  Cheneys  again  ? — 
not  the  sham  mass  of  the  Ritualists,  but  the  real  thing  ? 
Who  that  looks  on  England  now  can  say  that  it  will  not  ? 
And  four  miles  off  is  Amersham,  where  John  Knox  used 
to  preach,  and  Queen  Mary's  inquisitors  gathered  their 
batches  of  heretics  for  Smithfield.  On  the  pavement 
against  the  wall  lies  the  stone  figure  of  an  old  knight.. 


A    day's    FISHINTt    at    CHE]SrEYS.  235 

finislied  only  from  the  waist  upward.  The  knight  is  in 
liis  armor,  his  wife  rests  at  liis  side  ;  the  hands  of  both 
of  them  reverently  folded.  Opening  from  the  church 
on  the  north  side,  but  private,  and  not  used  for  service, 
is  the  Russell  Chapel.  Below  is  the  vault  where  the 
remains  lie  of  most  of  the  family  who  have  borne  the 
naja^e  for  three  centuries  and  a  half. 

'  '"'  *  "      *     •  •5t  -X-  *  * 

It  -is  worth  while  to  spend  a  day  at  Cheneys,  if  only 
for  Ltiie  breakfast — breakfast  on  fresh  pink  trout  from 
the  dies,  fresh  eggs,  fresh  yellow  butter,  cream  unde- 
tiled  by  chalk,  and  home-made  bread  untouched  with 
alum.  The  Russells  have  been  the  apostles  of  progress, 
T)nt  there  is  no  progress  in  their  own  dominion.  The 
ducal  warranty  is  on  everything  which  is  consumed 
licre.  - 

The  sun  was  shining  an  hour  ago.  It  is  now  raining  ; 
it  rained  all  yesterday  ;  the  clouds  are  coming  up  from 
the  south  and  the  wind  is  soft  as  oil.  The  day  is  still 
before  us,  and  it  is  a  day  made  for  trout  fishing.  The 
chapel  is  not  the  only  attraction  at  Cheneys.  Xo  river 
in  England  holds  finer  trout,  nor  trout  more  willing  to 
be  caught.  Why  fish  will  rise  in  one  stream  and  not  in 
another  is  a  problem  which  we  must  wait  to  understand, 
as  Bret  Ilarte  says,  in  "  another  and  a  better  world." 
The  Ches  at  any  rate  is  one  of  the  favored  waters. 
Great,  too,  is  the  Duke  of  Bedford — great  in  the  mill- 
ions he  has  spent  on  his  tenants'  cottages — great  in  the 
remission  of  his  rents  in  the  years  when  the  seasons  are 
unpropitious — great  in  the  administration  of  his  enor. 
mou8  property  ;  but  greater  than  all  in  the  management 
of  his  fishing,  for  if  he  gives  you  leave  to  fish  there,  you 
liave  the  stream  for  the  day  to  yourself.  You  are  in  no 
danger  of  seeing  your  favorite  pool  already  flogged  by 


2'iG  SKETCHES    FROM    .T.    A.   FROUDE. 

another  sportsman,  or  of  finding  rows  of  iignres  before  jou 
fringing  tlie  river  bank,  waving  their  long  wands  in  the 
air,  each  followed  by  his  boj  with  basket  and  generally 
useless  landing  net.  "  Competition"  and  "  the  greatest 
happiness  of  the  greatest  number"  are  not  heard  of  in 
this  antique  domain.  A  day's  fishing  at  Cheneys  means 
a  day  by  the  best  water  in  England  in  the  fisherman's 
paradise  of  solitude. 

Such  a  day's  privilege  had  been  extended  to  me  if  I 
cared  to  avail  myself  of  it,  when  I  was  coming  down  to 
see  the  chapel,  and  thougli  my  sporting  days  were  over, 
and  gun  and  rod  had  long  lain  undisturbed  in  their  boxes, 
yet  neither  the  art  of  fly-fishing,  nor  the  enjoyment  of 
it  when  once  acquired  and  tasted,  will  leave  us  except 
with  life.  The  hand  does  not  forget  its  cunning,  and  op- 
portunity begets  the  inclination  to  use  it.  I  had  brought 
my  fishing  case  along  with  me.  Shall  I  stay  at  the  inn 
over  the  day  and  try  what  can  be  done  ?  The  rain  and 
the  prospect  of  another  such  breakfast  decide  it  between 
them.  The  water-keeper  is  at  the  window — best  of 
keepers — for  he  will  accept  a  sandwich  perhaps  for  lunch- 
eon, a  pull  from  your  flask,  and  a  cigar  out  of  your 
case,  but  other  fee  on  no  condition.  The  rain,  he  tells 
me,  has  raised  the  water,  and  the  large  fish  are  on  the 
move,  the  May-fly  has  been  down  for  two  days.  They 
were  feeding  on  it  last  evening.  If  the  sky  clears  they 
will  take  well  in  the  afternoon  ;  but  the  fly  will  not 
show  till  the  rain  stops. 

Tlie  Cheneys  flshing  is  divided  in  the  middle  by  a 
mill.  Below  the  mill  the  trout  are  in  greatest  numbers, 
but  comparatively  small  ;  above  them  is  a  long,  still  deep 
pool  where  the  huge  monsters  lie,  and  in  common 
weather  never  stir  till  twilight.  The  keeper  and  I  re- 
member a  summer  evening  some  years  ago,    when  at 


A    day's    FISHIXG    at    CHENEYS.  237 

iiiglitfall,  after  a  burning  day,  the  glittering  surface  of 
the  water  was  dimpled  with  rings,  and  a  fly  thrown  into 
the  middle  of  these  circles  was  answered  more  than  once 
by  a  rush  and  scream  of  the  reel  ;  and  a  struggle  which 
ihe  darkness  made  more  exciting.  You  may  as  well  fish 
on  the  high  road  as  in  the  mill-pool  when  the  sun  is 
above  the  horizon,  and  even  at  night  you  will  rarely  suc- 
ceed there  ;  but  at  the  beginning  of  the  May-fly  season 
tkfese  large  fish  sometimes  run  up  to  the  rapid  stream  at 
tlie  pool  head  to  feed.  This  the  keeper  decides  shall  be 
tried  if  the  fly  conies  down.  For  the  morning  he  will 
leave  me  to  myself. 

Does  the  reader  care  to  hear  of  a  day's  fishing  in  a 
cliklk  stream  fifteen  miles  from  London  ?  As  music  to  the 
deaf,  as  poetry  to  the  political  economist,  as  a  mountain 
landscape  to  the  London  cockney,  so  is  chalk  stream 
trout  fishing  to  those  M'hu  never  felt  their  fingers  tingle 
as  the  line  whistles  through  the  rings.  For  them  I  write 
uo  further  ;  let  them  leave  the  page  uncut  and  turn  on 
to  the  next  article. 

Breakfast  over,  I  start  for  the  lower  water.  I  have 
my  boy  with  me,  home  for  the  holidays.  lie  carries  the 
lauding  net,  and  we  splash  through  the  rain  to  the  mill. 
The  river  runs  for  a  quarter  of  a  mile  down  under  hang- 
ing bushes.  As  with  other  accomplishments  when  once 
learned,  eye  and  hand  do  the  work  in  fly-fishing  without 
reference  to  the  mind  for  orders.  The  eye  tells  the  hand 
how  distant  the  bushes  are,  how  near  the  casting  line  ap- 
proaches them.  If  a  gust  of  wind  twists  it  into  a  heap, 
or  sweeps  it  toward  a  dangerous  bough,  the  wrist  does 
something  on  the  inslant  which  sends  the  fly  straight  and 
unhanned  into  the  water.  Practice  gives  our  different 
organs  functions  like  the  instinct  of  animals,  who  do 
wliat  their  liabits  require,  yet  know  not  what  they  do. 


238  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

The  small  fish  take  freely — some  go  back  into  the 
water,  the  few  in  good  condition  into  the  basket,  which, 
after  a  field  or  two,  becomes  perceptibly  heavier.  The 
governor,  a  small  humble  bee,  used  to  be  a  good  fly  at 
Cheneys,  and  so  did  the  black  alder.  Neither  of  them 
is  of  any  use  to-day.  The  season  has  been  cold  and  late. 
The  March  brown  answers  best,  with  the  never-failing 
red-spinner.  After  running  rapidly  through  two  or 
three  meadows,  the  river  opens  into  a  broad  smooth  shal- 
low, where  the  trout  are  larger,  and  the  water  being  ex- 
tremely clear,  are  specially  diflicult  to  catch.  In  such  a 
place  as  this,  it  is  useless  to  throw  your  fly  at  random 
upon  the  stream.  You  must  watch  for  a  fish  which  is 
rising,  and  you  must  fish  for  him  till  you  either  catch 
him  or  disturb  him.  It  is  not  enough  to  go  below  him 
and  throw  upward,  for  though  he  lies  with  his  head  up- 
stream, his  projecting  eye  looks  back  over  his  shoulders. 
You  must  hide  behind  a  bunch  of  rushes.  You  must 
crawl  along  the  grass  with  one  arm  only  raised.  If  the 
sun  is  shining  and  the  shadow  of  your  rod  glances  over 
the  gravel,  you  may  get  up  and  walk  away.  No  fish 
within  sight  will  stir  then  to  the  daintiest  cast. 

I  see  a  fish  close  to  the  bank  on  the  opposite  side,  lazi- 
ly lifting  his  head  as  a  fly  floats  past  him.  It  is  a  long 
throw,  but  the  wind  is  fair  and  he  is  worth  an  effort- - 
once,  twice,  three  times  I  fail  to  reach  him.  The  fourth 
I  land  the  fly  on  the  far  bank,  and  draw  it  gently  off 
upon  his  very  nose.  lie  swirls  in  the  M-ater  like  a  salm- 
on as  he  sweeps  round  to  seize  it.  There  is  a  splash — a 
sharp  jerk,  telling  unmistakably  that  something  has 
given  way.  A  large  fish  may  break  you  honestly  in 
weeds  or  round  a  rock  or  stump,  and  only  fate  is  to 
blame,  but  to  let  yourself  be  broken  on  the  first  strike  is 
unpardonable.      What  can  have  happened  ?     Alas,   the 


A    day's    FISHINTt    at    CHENEYS.  239 

red-spiimer  has  snapped  in  two  at  the  turn — a  new  fly 

bought  last  week  at 's,  whose  boast  it  has  been  that 

no  fly  of  his  was  ever  known  to  break  or  bend. 

One  grumbles  on  these  occasions,  for  it  is  always  the 
best  fish  which  one  loses  ;  and  as  imagination  is  free,  one 
may  call  him  what  weight  one  pleases.  The  damage  is 
spoji  repaired.  The  basket  fills  fast  as  trout  follows 
trout.  It  still  rains,  and  I  begin  to  think  that  1  have 
ha,d  enough  of  it.  I  have  promised  to  be  at  the  mill  at 
mid'-day,  and  then  we  shall  see. 

Evidently  the  sky  means  mischief.  Black  thunder- 
clouds pile  up  to  windward,  and  heavy  drops  continue 
falling.  But  there  is  a  break  in  the  south  as  I  ^valk 
baok  by  the  bank — a  gleam  of  sunshine  spans  the  valley 
with  a  rainbow,  and  an  actual  May-fly  or  two  sails  by, 
which  I  see  greedily  swallowed.  The  keeper  is  waiting  ; 
he  looks  scornfully  into  my  basket.  Fish — did  I  call 
these  herrings  fish  ?  I  must  try  the  upper  water  at  all 
events.  The  large  trout  were  feeding,  but  the  fly  was 
not  yet  properly  on — we  can  have  our  luncheon  first. 

How  pleasant  is  luncheon  on  mountain-side  or  river's 
bank,  wlien  you  fling  yourself  down  on  fern  or  heather 
after  your  morning's  work,  and  no  daintiest  entree  had 
ever  such  flavor  as  your  sandwiches,  and  no  champagne 
was  ever  so  exquisite  as  the  fresh  stream  water  just  tem- 
pered from  your  whiskey  flask.  Then  follows  the  smoke, 
when  the  keeper  fills  his  pipe  at  your  bag,  and  old  ad- 
ventures are  talked  over,  and  the  conversation  wanders 
on  through  anecdotes  and  experiences,  till,  as  you  listen 
to  the  shrewd  sense  and  kindly  feeling  of  your  compnn- 
ion,  you  become  aware  that  the  steep  difference  which 
you  had  imagined  to  be  created  by  education  and  habits 
of  life  had  no  existence  save  in  your  own  conceit.  Fort- 
une is  less  unjust  than  she  seems,  and  true  hearts  and 


240  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A,   FROUDE. 

clear-judging  liealtlij  minds  are  bred  as  easily  in  the  cot- 
tage as  the  palace. 

But  time  runs  on,  and  I  must  hasten  to  the  end  of  my 
storj.  The  short  respite  from  the  wet  is  over.  Down 
falls  the  rain  again — rain  not  to  be  measured  by  inches, 
but  by  feet  ;  rain  such  as  lias  rarely  been  seen  in  Eng- 
land before  this  "  sestas  mirabilis"  of  1879.  It  looks 
liopeless,  but  the  distance  by  the  road  to  the  top  of  the 
water  is  not  great.  We  complain  if  we  are  caught  in  a 
shower  ;  we  splash  along  in  a  deluge,  in  boots  and  water- 
l^roof,  as  composedly  as  if  we  wei-e  seals  or  otters.  The 
river  is  rising,  and,  as  seldom  happens  with  a  chalk 
stream,  it  is  growing  discolored.  Every  lane  is  running 
with  a  brown  stream,  which  finds  its  way  at  last  into  the 
main  channel.  The  highest  point  is  soon  reached.  The 
first  hundred  yards  are  shallow,  and  to  keep  the  cattle 
from  straying  a  high  iron  railing  runs  along  the  bank. 
Well  I  knew  that  iron  railing.  You  must  stand  on  the 
lower  bar  to  fish  over  it.  If  you  hook  a  trout  you  must 
play  him  from  that  uneasy  perch  in  a  rapid  current 
among  weeds  and  stones,  and  your  attendant  must  use 
his  landing-net  through  the  bars.  Generally  it  is  the 
liveliest  spot  in  the  river,  but  nothing  can  be  done  there 
to-day.  There  is  a  ford  immediately  above,  into  which 
the  thick  road-water  is  pouring,  and  the  fish  cannot  see 
the  fly.  Shall  we  give  it  up  ?  Not  yet.  Farther  down 
the  mud  settles  a  little,  and  by  this  time  even  the  road 
has  been  washed  clean,  and  less  dirt  comes  off  it.  The 
flood  stirs  the  trout  into  life  and  hunger,  and  their  eyes, 
accustomed  to  the  transparency  of  the  chalk  water,  do 
not  see  you  so  quickly. 

Below  the  shallow  there  is  a  pool  made  by  a  small 
weir,  over  which  the  flood  is  now  rushing  ;  on  one  side 
there  is  an   open  hatchway,    with    the  stream   pouring 


A    day's    fishing    at   CHENEYS.  241 

through.  The  banks  are  bushy,  and  over  the  deepest 
part  of  the  pool  the  stem  of  a  hirge  ash  projects  into  the 
river.  Yesterday,  when  the  water  was  lower,  the 
keeper  saw  a  four-pounder  lying  under  that  stem. 
Between  the  weir  and  tlie  trees  it  is  an  awkward  spot, 
1)ut  difficulty  is  the  charm  of  fly-fishing.  The  dangerous 
drop  fly  must  be  taken  off  ;  a  drop  fly  is  only  fit  for 
open  waterj  where  there  is  neither  weed  nor  stump. 
Tlie  March  browni  is  sent  skimming  at  the  tail  of  the 
c^ing-line,  to  be  dropped,  if  possible,  just  above  the 
ash,  and  to  be  carried  under  it  by  the  stream.  It  has 
been  caught  in  a  root,  so  it  seems  ;  or  it  is  foul  some- 
where. Surely  no  fish  ever  gave  so  dead  a  pull.  No  ; 
it  is  no  root.  The  line  shoots  under  the  bank.  There  is 
a  broad  flash  of  white  just  below  the  surface,  a  moment's 
struggle,  th(r-rod  springs  straight,  and  the  line  comes 
back  unbroken.  The  March  brown  is  still  floating  at 
the  end  of  it.  It  was  a  big  fish,  perhaps  the  keeper's 
very  big  one  ;  he  must  have  been  lightly  hooked,  and 
have  rubbed  the  fly  out  of  his  mouth. 

But  let  us  look  closer.  The  red-spinner  had  played 
false  in  the  mornino;  ;  niav  not  something  like  it  have 
befallen  the  March  brown  ?  Something  like  it,  indeed. 
The  hook  has  straightened  out  as  if,  instead  of  steel,  it 
had  been  made  of  copper.  A  pretty  business  !  I  try 
another,  and  another,  with  the  same  result.  The  heavy 
trout   take  them,  and  one   bends   and  the  next  breaks. 

Oh !     Well  for  Charles  Kingsley  that  he  was 

gone  l>efore  he  heard  <»f  a  treason  which  would  have 
broken  his  trust  in  man.  You,  in  whose  praise  I  have 
heard  him  so  often  ehxpicnt  I  You  who  never  dealt  in 
shoddy  goods.  You  wlio  were  faithful  if  all  else  were 
faithless,  and  redeemed  the  credit  of  English  tradesmen  ! 
You  had  not  tlien  l)een    in   tliu  school  of  progress  an<l 


242  SKETCHES    FROM    J,   A.   FROUDE. 

leai-ned  that  it  was  the  buyer's  business  to  distinguish 
good  from  bad.  You  never  fiirnislied  your  customers 
with  cheap  and  nasty  wares,  fair  looking  to  the  eye  and 
worthless  to  the  touch  and  trial.  In  those  days  you 
dealt  with  gentlemen,  and  you  felt  and  traded  like  a 
gentleman  yourself.  And  now  you,  too,  have  gone  the 
way  of  your  fellows.  You  are  making  a  fortune,  as  you 
call  it,  out  of  the  reputation  which  you  won  honorably 
in  better  days.  You  have  given  yourself  over  to  compe- 
tition and  semblance.  You  have  entered  for  the  race 
among  the  sharpers  and  will  win  by  knavery  and  tricks 
like  the  rest.  I  will  not  name  you  for  the  sake  of  the 
old  times,  when  C.  K.  and  I  could  send  you  a  descrip- 
tion of  a  fly  from  the  farthest  corner  of  Ireland,  and  by 
return  of  post  would  come  a  packet  tied  on  hooks  which 
Kendal  and  Limerick  might  equal,  but  could  not  excel. 
You  may  live  on  undenounced  for  me  ;  but  read  C.  K.'s 
l)ooks  over  again  ;  repent  of  your  sins,  go  back  to  honest 
ways,  and  renounce  the  new  gospel,  in  which  whosoever 
believes  shall  not  be  saved. 

But  what  is  to  be  done  ?  Spite  of  the  rain  the  river  is 
now  covered  with  drowned  May-flies,  and  the  trout  are 
taking  them  all  round.  I  liave  new  May -flies  from  the 
same  quarter  in  my  book,  but  it  will  be  mere  vexation 
to  try  them.  Luckily  for  me  there  are  a  few  old  ones 
surviving  from  other  days.  The  gut  is  brown  with  age 
— but  I  must  venture  it.  If  this  breaks  1  will  go  home, 
lock  away  my  rod,  and  write  an  essay  on  the  effects  of 
the  substitution  of  Political  Economy  for  the  Christian 
faith. 

On,  then,  goes  one  of  these  old  flies.  It  looks  well. 
It  bears  a  mild  strain,  and,  like  Don  Quixote  with  his 
helmet,  I  will  not  put  it  to  a  severe  trial.  Out  it  shoots 
over  the  jjooI,  so  natural-looking  that  I  cannot  distin- 


A    day's   FISHIXG    at   CHENEYS.  243 

guisli  it  from  a  real  fly  which  floats  at  its  side.  I  can- 
not,  nor  can  tliat  large  trout  in  the  smooth  water  above 
the  fall.  He  takes  it,  springs  into  the  air,  and  then  darts 
at  the  weir  to  throw  himself  over.  If  he  goes  down  he 
is  lost.  Hold  on.  He  has  the  stream  to  help  him,  and 
not  an  inch  of  line  can  be  sjjared.  The  rod  bends 
double,  but.  the  old  gnt  is  true.  Down  the  fall  he  is 
not  to  go.  He  turns  up  tlie  pool,  he  makes  a  dart  for 
th'6  hatchway — but  if  you  can  stand  a  trout's  first  rush 
you  need  not  fear  him  in  fair  water  afterward.  A  few 
more  ejfforts  and  he  is  in  the  net  and  on  the  bank,  not 
the  keepers  four-pounder,  but  a  handsome  fish  which  I 
know  that  he  will  approve. 

,<He  had  walked  down  the  bank  pensively  while  I  was 
in  the  difficulty  with  my  flies,  meditating,  perhaps,  on 
idle  gentlemen,  and  reflecting  that  if  the  tradesmen 
were  knaves  the  gentlemen  were  correspondingly  fools. 
He  called  to  me  to  come  to  him  just  as  I  had  lauded  my 
trout.  He  was  standing  by  the  side  of  the  rapid  stream 
at  the  head  of  tlie  mill  pool.  It  was  as  he  had  foretold  ; 
the  great  fish  had  come  up,  and  were  rolling  like  salmon 
on  the  top  of  the  water,  gulping  down  the  May- flies. 
Even  when  they  are  thus  carelessly  ravenous,  the  clear- 
ness of  the  river  creates  a  certain  difficulty  in  catching 
them  in  ordinary  times,  but  to-day  the  flood  made  cau- 
tion supci-fluous.  They  were  splashing  on  the  surface 
close  to  our  feet,  rolling  about  in  a  negligent  gluttony 
wliich  seemed  to  take  from  them  every  thought  of  danger, 
for  a  distance  of  at  least  three  hundrotl  yards. 

There  was  no  longer  any  ;ilarm  for  the  tackle  and  it 
was  but  to  throw  the  fly  upon  the  river,  near  or  far,  for 
a  trout  instantly  to  seize  it.  There  was  no  shy  rising 
where  suspicion  balks  the  appetite.  The  fish  were  swal- 
lowing   with    a    deliberate    seriousness    every  fly  which 


244  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

drifted  witliin  their  reach,  snapping  their  jaws  upon  it 
with  a  gulp  of  satisfaction.  The  only  difficulty  was  in 
playing  them  when  hooked  with  a  delicate  chalk-stream 
casting-line.  For  an  hour  and  a  half  it  lasted,  such  an 
hour  and  a  half  of  trout  fishing  as  1  had  never  seen  and 
shall  never  see  again.  The  ease  of  success  at  last  became 
wearisome.  Two  large  baskets  were  filled  to  the  brim. 
Accident  had  thrown  in  my  way  a  singular  opportunity 
which  it  would  have  been  wrong  to  abuse,  so  I  decided 
to  stop.  We  emptied  out  our  spoils  upon  the  grass,  and 
the  old  keeper  said  that  long  as  he  had  known  the  river 
he  had  never  but  once  seen  so  many  fish  of  so  large  size 
taken  in  the  Ches  in  a  single  day  by  a  single  rod. 

How  can  a  reasonable  creature  find  pleasure  in  having 
performed  such  an  exploit  ?  If  trout  were  wanted  for 
human  food,  a  net  would  have  answered  the  purpose 
with  less  trouble  to  the  man  and  less  annoyance  to  the 
fish.  Throughout  creation  man  is  the  only  animal — 
man,  and  the  dogs  and  cats  which  have  learned  from  him 
— who  kills,  for  the  sake  of  killing,  what  he  does  not 
want,  and  calls  it  sport.  All  other  animals  seize  their 
prey  only  when  hungry,  and  are  satisfied  when  their 
hunger  is  appeased. 

Such,  it  can  only  be  answered,  is  man's  disposition. 
He  is  a  curiously  formed  creature,  and  the  appetite  for 
sport  does  not  seem  to  disappear  with  civilization.  The 
savage  in  his  natural  state  hunts,  as  the  animals  hunt,  to 
support  his  life  ;  the  sense  of  sport  is  strongest  in  the 
elaborately  educated  and  civilized.  It  may  be  that  the 
taste  will  die  out  before  "  Progress."  Our  descendants 
perhaps,  a  few  generations  hence,  may  look  back  upon  a 
pheasant  battue  as  we  look  back  on  bear-baiting  and 
bull-fighting,  and  our  mild  offspring,  instructed  in  the 
theory  of  development,  may  see  a  proof  in  their  father's 


A   day's   fishing   at   CHENEYS.  245 

habits  that  they  come  of  a  race  who  were  once  crueller 
than  tigers,  and  will  congratulate  themselves  on  the 
change.  So  they  will  think,  if  they  judge  us  as  we  judge 
our  forefathers  of  the  days  of  the  Plantagenets  and 
Tudors,  and  both  we  and  they  may  be  perhaps  mistaken. 
-Half  the  lives  of  men  in  mediaeval  Europe  was  spent  in 

'"'fighting.  '  Yet  from  mediaeval  Europe  came  the  knightly 
graces  of  courtesy  and  chivalry.  The  modern  soldier, 
whose  trade  is  war,  yet  hates  and  dreads  war  more  than 
.civilians  dread  it.  The  sportsman's  knowledge  of  the 
habits  of  animals  gives  him  a  kindly  feeling  toward 
them  notwithstanding,  and  sporting  tends  rather  to  their 

-  preservation  than  their  destruction.  The  human  race 
may  become  at  last  vegetarians  and  water-drinkers. 
Astraea  may  come  back,  and  man  may  cease  to  take  the 
life  of  bird,  or  beast,  or  fish.  But  the  lion  will  not  lie 
down  with  the  lamb,  for  lambs  and  lions  will  no  longer 
be  ;  the  eagle  will  not  feed  beside  the  dove,  for  doves 
will  not  be  allowed  to  consume  grain  which  might  have 
served  as  human  food,  and  will  be  extinct  as  the  dodo. 
It  may  be  all  right  and  fit  and  proper  :  a  world  of  harm- 
less vegetarians  may  be  the  appropriate  outcome  of  the 
development  of  humanity.  But  we  who  have  been  born 
in  a  ruder  age  do  not  aspire  to  rise  beyond  the  level  of 
our  own  times.  We  have  toiled,  we  have  suffei'ed,  we 
have  enjoyed,  as  the  nature  which  we  have  received  has 
prompted  us.  We  blame  our  fathers'  habits  ;  our  chil- 
dren may  blame  oiirs  in  turn  ;  yet  we  may  be  sitting  in 
judgment,  both  of  us,  on  matters  of  which  we  know 
nothing. 


IX. 

THOMAS  CARLYLE  AND  HIS  WIFE.* 

THEIR    ENGAGEMENT. 

When  Irving  first  settled  in  London  he  had  opened 
the  secrets  of  his  heart  to  a  certain  lady  with  whom  he  was 
very  intimately  acquainted.  He  had  told  her  of  his  love 
for  his  old  pupil,  and  she  had  drawn  from  him  that  the 
love  had  been  returned.  She  had  seen  Irving  sacrifice 
himself  to  duty,  and  she  had  heard  that  his  resolution 
had  been  sustained  by  the  person  to  whom  the  surrender 
of  their  mutual  hopes  had  been  as  bitter  as  to  himself. 
The  lady  was  romantic,  and  had  become  profoundly  in- 
terested. Flowing  over  with  sympathy,  she  had  herself 
commenced  a  correspondence  with  Haddington.  To 
Carlyle  she  wrote  occasionally,  because  she  really  ad- 
mired him.  To  Miss  Welsh  she  introduced  herself  as 
one  who  was  eager  for  her  confidence,  who  was  prepared 
to  love  her  for  the  many  excellences  which  she  knew  lier 
to  possess,  and  to  administer  balm  to  the  wounds  of  her 
heart. 

Miss  Welsh  did  not  respond  very  cordially  to  this 
effusive  invitation.     It  was  not  her  habit  to  seek  for  sym- 

*  From  "  Thomas  Carlyle  :  the  first  forty  years  of  his  Life." 
The  first  extract  here  given  explains  certain  incidents  which  led 
to  the  engagement  of  Carlyle  and  Miss  Welsh  and  which  have 
been  the  subject  of  much  printed  gossip.  The  second  extract 
reveals  in  a  few  words  the  sources  of  the  un happiness  for  which 
Mrs.  Carlyle  has  been  so  widely  and  deservedly  pitied. — Editor. 


THOMAS   CARLYLE    AND    HIS    WIFE.  247 

pathy  from  strangers  ;  but  she  replied  in  a  letter  wliicli 
her  new  friend  found  extremely  beautiful,  and  which 
stirred  her  interest  still  deeper.  The  lady  imagined  that 
her  young  correspondent  was  still  pining  in  secret  for  her 

-''lost  lover,  and  she  was  tempted  to  approach  closer  to  the 
gjabject  which  had  aroused  her  sympathies.     She  thought 

^it   would  -be.  well   slightly   to    disparage    Irving.     She 

painted   him   as   a  person   whose   inconstancy    did    not 

^deserve  a  prolonged  and  hopeless  affection.     She  too  had 

'sought  to  find  in  him  the  dearest  of  friends  ;  but  he  had 
other  interests  and  other  ambitions,  and  any  woman  who 
concentrated  her  heart  upon  him  would  be  disappointed 

^  in  the  return  which  she  might  meet  with. 

■  -^  The  lady's  motive  was  admirable.  She  thought  that 
she  could  assist  in  reconciling  Miss  "Welsh  to  her  disap- 
pointment. In  perfect  innocence  she  wrote  confiden- 
tially to  Carlyle  on  the  same  subject.  She  regarded  him 
simply  as  the  intimate  friend  both  of  Miss  Welsh  and 
Irving.  She  assumed  that  he  was  acquainted  with  their 
secret  history.  She  spoke  of  the  affection  which  had 
existed  between  them  as  still  unextinguished  on  either 
side.  For  the  sake  of  both  of  them  she  wished  that 
something  might  be  done  to  put  an  end  to  idle  regrets 
and  vain  imaginings.  Nothing,  she  thought,  could  con- 
tribute more  to  disenchant  Miss  "Welsh  than  a  visit  to 
herself  in  London,  where  she  could  see  Irving  as  he  wa£ 
in  his  present  surroundings.* 

*  No  part  of  this  language  is  the  lady's  own.  The  substance  of 
her  letters  was  repeated  in  tlie  correspondence  which  followed 
between  Carlyle  and  Miss  Weisii.  I  have  alluded  to  the  subject 
only  because  Mrs.  Carlyle  said  afterward  that  but  for  the  uncon- 
scious action  of  a  comparative  stranger,  her  engagement  witli 
Carlyle  would  probably  never  liave  been  carried  out. — Note  by 
TEE  Author. 


248  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

Miss  Welsh  had  for  two  years  never  mentioned  Irving 
to  Carlyle  except  bitterly  and  conteinptnonsly  ;  so  bit- 
terly indeed  that  lie  had  often  been  obliged  to  remon- 
strate. Had  he  been  less  single-minded,  a  tone  so 
marked  and  acid  might  have  roused  his  suspicions.  But 
that  Irving  and  she  had  been  more  than  friends,  if  he 
had  ever  heard  a  hint  of  it,  had  passed  out  of  his  mind. 
Even  the  lady's  letter  failed  to  startle  him.  He  men- 
tioned merely,  when  he  next  wrote  to  Miss  Welsh,  that  the 
writer  labored  under  some  strange  delusion  about  her 
secret  history,  and  had  told  him  in  a  letter  full  of  elo- 
quence that  her  heart  was  with  Irving  in  London. 

Miss  Welsh  felt  that  she  must  at  least  satisfy  her 
ecstatic  acquaintance  that  she  was  not  pining  for  another 
woman's  husband.  She  was  even  more  explicit.  She 
had  made  up  her  mind  to  marry  Carlyle.  She  told  her 
intrusive  correspondent  so  in  jslain  \vords,  desiring  her 
only  to  keep  her  secret.  The  lady  was  thunder-struck. 
In  ordinary  life  she  was  high-flown,  and  by  those  who 
did  not  know  her  might  have  been  thought  affected  and 
unreal  ;  but  on  occasions  really  serious  she  could  feel 
and  write  like  a  wise  woman.  She  knew  that  Miss 
Welsh  could  not  love  Carlyle.  The  motive  could  only 
be  a  generous  hope  of  making  life  dearer,  and  want  of 
health  more  endurable,  to  an  honest  and  excellent  man, 
while  she  might  be  seeking  blindly  to  All  a  void  which 
was  aching  in  her  own  heart.  She  required  Miss  Welsh, 
she  most  solemnly  adjured  her,  to  examine  herself,  and 
not  allow  one  who  had  known  much  disappointment  and 
many  sorrows  to  discover  by  a  comparison  of  his  own 
feelings  with  hers  that  she  had  come  to  him  with  half  a 
heart,  and  had  mistaken  compassion  and  the  self-satisfac- 
tion of  a  generous  act  for  a  sentiment  which  could  alone 
sustain  her  in  a  struggle  through  life.     Supposing  acei- 


TITONfAS    (JAKLYLE    AXD    HIS    WIFE.  249 

dent  should  set  Irving  free,  supposing;  his  love  to  have 
been  indestructible,  and  to  have  been  surrendered  only 
in  obedience  to  duty,  and  supposing  him,  not  knowhig  of 
this  new  engagement,  to  come  back  and  claim  the  heart 
from  which  an  adverse  fate  had  separated  him,  what  in 
s^ch  a  case  would  her  feeling  be  ?     If  she  could  honestly 

o^y  that  she  would  still  prefer  Carlyle,  then  let  her  marry 
him,  and  the  sooner  the  better.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
glie  was  obliged  to  confess  to  herself  that  she  could  still 
Und  hajipiness  where  she  had  hoped  to  find  it,  Irving 
might  still  be  lost  to  her  ;  but  in  such  a  condition  of 
mind  she  had  no  right  to  marry  any  one  else.  "With 
characteristic  integrity   Miss  Welsh,    on    receiving  this 

,  letter,  instantly  inclosed  it  to  Carlyle.  She  had  been 
under  no  obligation,  at  least  until  their  marriage  had 
been  definitely  determined  on,  to  inform  him  of  the  ex- 
tent of  her  attachment  to  Irvang.  But  sincere  as  she 
was  to  a  fault  in  the  ordinary  occasions  of  life,  she  had 
in  this  matter  not  only  kept  back  the  truth,  but  had  pur- 
posely misled  Carlyle  as  to  the  nature  of  her  feelings. 
She  felt  that  she  must  make  a  full  confession.  She  had 
deceived  him — wilfully  deceived  him.  She  had  even 
told  him  that  she  had  never  cared  for  Irving.  "  It  was 
false,"  she  said.  She  had  loved  him — once  passionately 
loved  him.  For  this  she  might  be  forgiven.  "  If  she 
had  shown  weakness  in  loving  a  man  whom  she  knew  to 
be  engaged  to  another,  she  had  made  amends  in  persuad- 
ing him  to  marry  the  other,  and  save  his  honor  from  re- 
proach." But  she  had  disguised  her  real  feelings,  and 
for  this  she  had  no  excuse.  She  who  had  felt  herself 
Carlyle's  superior  in  their  late  controversy,  and  had  been 
aljle  to  rebuke  him  for  selfishness,  felt  herself  degraded 
and  humbled  in  his  eyes.  If  he  chose  to  cast  her  off,  she 
said  that  she  could  not  say  he  was  unjust  ;  but  her  pride 


250  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   EROUDE. 

was  broken  ;  and  very  naturally,  very  toiicliingly,  she 
added  that  he  had  never  been  so  dear  to  her  as  at  that 
moment  when  she  was  in  danger  of  losing  his  affection 
and,  what  was  still  more  precious  to  her,  his  respect. 

If  Carlyle  had  been  made  of  common  stuff,  so  unex- 
pected a  revelation  might  have  tried  his  vanity.  The 
actual  effect  was  to  awaken  in  him  a  sense  of  his  own 
unworthiness.  He  perceived  that  Miss  Welsh  was  prob- 
ably accepting  him  only  out  of  the  motives  which  Mrs. 
Montagu  suggested.  His  infirmities,  mental  and  bodily, 
might  make  him  an  unfit  companion  for  her,  or  indeed 
for  any  woman.  It  would  be  l)etter  for  her  once  for  all 
to  give  him  up.  He  knew,  he  said,  that  he  could  never 
make  her  happy.  They  might  suffer  at  parting,  but 
they  would  have  obeyed  their  reason,  and  tinie  would 
deaden  the  j^ain,  No  affection  was  unalterable  or  eter- 
nal. Men  themselves,  with  all  their  passions,  sunk  to 
dust  and  were  consumed.  He  must  imitate  her  sincerity. 
He  said  (and  he  spoke  with  perfect  truth)  that  there  was 
a  strange,  dark  humor  in  him  over  which  he  had  no  con- 
trol. If  she  thought  they  were  "  blue  devils,  weak  quer- 
ulous wailings  of  a  mind  distempered,"  she  would  only 
show  that  she  did  not  understand  him.  In  a  country 
town  she  had  seen  nothing  of  life,  and  had  grasped  at 
the  shadows  that  passed  by  her.  First,  the  rude,  smoky 
fire  of  Edward  Irving  seemed  to  her  a  star  from  heaven  ; 
next,  the  quivering  ignis  fatu us  of  the  soul  that  dwelt 
in  himself.  The  world  had  a  thousand  noble  hearts  that 
she  did  not  dream  of.  What  was  he,  and  what  was  his 
father's  house,  that  she  should  sacrifice  herself  for  him  ? 

It  was  not  in  nature — it  was  not  at  least  in  Miss 
Welsh's  nature — that  at  such  a  time  and  under  such  cir- 
cumstances she  should  recoTisider  her  resohition.  She 
was  staying  with  her  grandfather  at  Templand  when 


THOMAS    CARLYLE    AND    HIS    WIFE.  351 

tliese  letters  were  intercliauged.  She  (Icterniined  to  use 
the  opportunity  to  pav  the  Carlyles  her  jjroinise J  visit,  see 
liim  in  his  own  home  and  his  own  circle,  and  there  face 
to  face  explain  all  the  past  and  form  some  scheme  for 
the  immediate  future.  Like  the  lady  in  London,  she  felt 
that  if  the  marriao^e  was  to  be,  or  rather  since  the  mar- 
fflige  was  to  be,  the  sooner  it  was  over  now  the  better 
for  every  one. 
/•• 

"i,  THEIR    MARRIED    LIFE. 

Thus  the  six  years'  imprisonment  on  the  Dumfries- 
shire moors  came  to  an  end.  To  Carlyle  himself  they 
had  been  years  of  inestimable  value.  If  we  compare  the 
esfeay  on  Jean  Paul,  which  he  wrote  at  Comely  Bank, 
with  the  "Diamond  Necklace,"  his  last  work  at 
Craigenputtock,  we  see  the  leap  from  promise  to  fulfil- 
ment, from  the  hnmature  energy  of  youth  to  the  full  in- 
tellectual strength  of  completed  manhood.  The  solitude 
had  compelled  him  to  digest  his  thoughts.  In  "  Sartor" 
he  liad  relieved  his  soul  of  its  perilous  secretions  by 
throwing  out  of  himself  his  personal  suffei'ings  and  phys- 
ical and  spiritual  experience.  lie  had  read  omnivo- 
ously  far  and  wide.  Ills  memory  was  a  magazine  of 
facts  gathered  over  the  whole  surface  of  European  liter- 
ature and  history.  The  multiplied  allusions  in  every 
page  of  his  later  essays,  so  easy,  so  unlabored,  reveal  the 
wealth  which  he  had  accumulated,  and  the  fulness  of 
his  command  over  his  possessions.  His  religious  faith 
had  gained  solidity.  His  conlidence  in  the  soundness  of 
his  own  convictions  was  no  longer  clouded  with  the 
shadow  of  a  doubt.  The  "  History  of  the  French  Rev- 
olution,''' the  most  powerful  of  all  his  works,  and  the 
only  one  which  has  the  character  of  a  work  of  art,  was 
the  production  of  the  mind  which  he  brought  with  him 


252  SKETCHES    FKOM    J.    A.   FROUDE. 

froTii  Craigenputtock,  iiiidistiii-bed  bj  tlie  contradictions 
and  excitements  of  London  society  and  London  triumphs. 
lie  had  been  tried  in  the  furnace.  Poverty,  mortifica- 
tion, and  disappointment  had  done  their  work  upon  him, 
and  he  had  risen  above  them  elevated,  purilied,  and 
strengthened.  Even  tlie  arrogance  and  self-assertion 
wliicli  Lord  Jeffrey  supposed  to  have  been  developed  in 
him  by  living  away  from  conflict  with  other  minds,  had 
been  rather  tamed  than  encouraged  by  his  lonely  medi- 
tations. It  was  rather  collision  with  those  who  differed 
with  him  which  fostered  his  imperiousness  ;  for  Carlyle 
rarely  met  with  an  antagonist  whom  he  could  not  over- 
Ijear  with  the  torrent  of  his  metaphors,  while  to  himsell 
his  notebooks  show  that  he  read  many  a  lecture  on 
humility. 

He  had  laid  in,  too,  on  the  moors,  a  stock  of  robust 
health.  Lamentations  over  indigestion  and  want  of 
sleep  are  almost  totally  absent  from  the  letters  written 
from  Craigenputtock.  The  simple,  natural  life,  the 
wholesome  air,  the  daily  rides  or  drives,  the  pure  food — 
milk,  cream,  eggs,  oatmeal,  the  best  of  their  kind — had 
restored  completely  the  functions  of  a  stomach  never, 
perhaps,  so  far  wrong  as  he  had  imagined.  Carlyle  had 
ceased  to  complain  on  this  head,  and  in  a  person  so  ex- 
tremely vocal  when  anything  was  amiss  with  him,  silence 
is  the  best  evidence  that  there  was  nothing  to  complain 
of.  On  the  moors,  as  at  Mainhill,  at  Edinburgh,  or  in 
London  afterward,  he  was  always  impatient,  moody,  ir- 
ritable, violent.  These  humors  were  in  his  nature,  and 
could  no  more  be  separated  from  them  than  his  body 
could  leap  off  its  shadow.  But,  intolerable  as  he  had 
found  Craigenputtock  in  the  later  years  of  his  residence 
there,  he  looked  back  to  it  afterward  as  the  happiest  and 
^vholesomest  home  that  he  had  ever  known.     He  could 


THOMAS    CARLYLE    AND    HIS    WIFE.  253 

do  fully  twice  as  much  work  there,  he  said,  as  he  could 
ever  do  afterward  in  London  ;  and  many  a  time,  when 
sick  of  fame  and  clatter  and  interruption,  he  longed  to 
return  to  it. 

.  To  Mrs.  Carlyle  Craigenputtock  had  been  a  less  salu- 
tary home.  She  might  have  borne  the  climate,  and  even 
bfnetited  by  it,  if  the  other  conditions  had  been  less  un- 
genial.  But  her  -  life  there,  to  begin  with,  had  been 
a-life  of  menial  drudgery,  unsolaced  (for  she  could  have 
jerrdured  and  even  enjoyed  mere  hardship)  by  more  than 
an  occasional  word  of  encouragement  or  sympathy  or 
compassion  from  her  husband.  To  him  it  seemed  per- 
fectly natural  that  what  his  mother  did  at  Scotsbrig  his 
wife  should  do  for  him.  Every  household  duty  fell 
upon  her,  either  directly,  or  in  supplying  the  short- 
comings of  a  Scotch  maid-of-all-work.  She  had  to  cook, 
to  sew,  to  scour,  to  clean  ;  to  galloj)  down  alone  to 
Dumfries  if  anything  was  wanted  ;  to  keep  the  Louse, 
and  even  on  occasions  to  milk  the  cows.  Miss  Jews- 
bury  has  preserved  many  anecdotes  of  the  Craigen- 
puttock life,  showing  how  hard  a  time  her  friend  had  of 
it  there.  Carlyle,  though  disposed  at  first  to  dismiss 
these  memories  as  legends,  yet  admitted,  on  reflection, 
that  for  all  there  was  a  certain  foundation.  The  errors, 
if  any,  can  be  no  more  than  the  slight  alterations  of  form 
which  stories  naturally  receive  in  repetition.  A  lady 
brought  up  in  luxury  has  been  educated  into  physical 
unfitness  for  so  sharp  a  discipline.  Mrs.  Carlyle's  bodily 
health  never  recovered  from  the  strain  of  those  six  years. 
Tiie  trial  to  her  mind  and  to  her  nervous  system  was  istill 
more  severe.  Nature  had  given  her,  along  with  a 
powerful  understanding,  a  disposition  singularly  bright 
and  buoyant.  The  Irving  disappointmont  had  been  a 
blow  to  her  ;  but  M'ounds  wliidi   do  not   kill  are  cured. 


2")\  SKETCnUS    FROM    ,T.   A.   FROUDE. 

Thej  leave  a  scar,  but  the  pain  ceases.  It  was  long 
over  ;  and  if  Carlyle  liad  been  a  real  companion  to  her, 
she  would  have  been  as  happy  with  him  as  wives  usually 
are.  But  he  was  not  a  companion  at  all.  When  he  was 
busy  she  rarely  so  much  as  saw  him,  save,  as  he  himself 
pathetically  tells,  when  she  would  steal  into  his  dressing- 
room  in  the  morning  when  he  was  shaving,  to  secure 
that  little  of  his  society.  The  loneliness  of  Craigenput- 
tock  was  dreadful  to  her.  Iler  hard  work,  perhaps,  had 
so  i'di'  something  of  a  blessing  in  it,  that  it  was  a  relief 
from  the  intolerable  pressure.  For  months  together, 
especially  after  Alick  Carlyle  had  gone,  they  never  saw 
the  face  of  guest  or  passing  stranger.  So  still  the  moors 
were  that  she  could  hear  the  sheep  nibbling  the  grass  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  off.  For  the  many  weeks  when  the 
snow  was  on  the  ground  she  could  not  stir  beyond  the 
garden,  or  even  beyond  her  door.  She  had  no  great 
thoughts,  as  Carlyle  had,  to  occupy  her  with  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  universe.  He  had  deranged  the  faith 
in  which  she  had  been  brought  up,  but  he  had  not  inoc- 
ulated her  with  his  own  ;  and  a  dull  gloom,  sinking  at 
last  almost  to  apathy,  fell  upon  her  spirits.  She  fought 
against  it,  like  a  l)rave  woman  as  she  was.  Carlyle's 
own  views  of  the  prospects  of  men  in  this  world  were 
not  brilliant.  In  his  "  Miscellanies"  is  a  small  poem, 
written  at  Craigenputtock,  called  "  Cui  Bono  ?"  giving 
a  most  unpromising  sketch  of  human  destiny  : 

"  Cui  Bono? 

"  What  is  Hope  ?  a  smiling  raiabow 
Children  follow  through  the  wet  ; 
'Tis  not  here,  still  yonder,  yonder  ! 
Never  urchin  found  it  yet. 


THOMAS    CAKLYLE    AND    HIS    WIFE.  255 

"  What  is  Life  ?  a  thawing  iceboard 
Oq  a  sea  with  sunny  shore. 
Gay  we  sail — it  melts  beneath  us  ! 
We  are  sunk,  and  seen  no  more. 

"  What  is  Man  ?  a  foolish  baby  ; 
---"  Vainly  strives  and  fights  and  frets  ; 

'"'*  Demanding  all— deserving  nothing  ! 

f/^  One  small  grave  is  what  he  gets." 

In  one  of  Mrs.  Carlyle's  note-books  1  liiid  an  ''  An- 
sjrer"  to  tliis,  dated  1830  : 

' '  Nay,  this  is  Hope  :  a  gentle  dove. 
That  nestles  in  the  gentle  breast, 
^   ......;  Bringing  glad  tidings  from  above 

'/  Of  joys  to  come  and  heavenly  rest. 

'*  Arfd  this  is  Life  :  ethereal  tire 

Striving  aloft  tlirough  smothering  clay  ; 
Mounting,  flaming,  higher,  higher  ! 
Till  lost  in  immortality. 

'•  And  Man — oh  !  hate  not  nor  despise 
The  fairest,  lordliest  work  of  God  ! 
Think  not  He  made  the  good  and  wise 
Only  to  sleep  beneath  the  sod  !" 

Carlylo  liimself  recognized  occasionally  that  she  was 
not  happy,  rntcntionally  unkind  it  was  not  in  his  nat- 
ure to  be.  After  his  motlier,  lie  loved  his  wife  better 
than  any  one  in  the  world.  He  was  only  occupied,  un- 
perceiving,  negligent,  and,  when  he  did  see  that  any- 
thing was  wrong  with  her,  he  was  at  once  the  tenderest 
of  husbands. 


X. 


EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  POLITICAL 
ECONOMY.* 

The  reconquest  of  Ireland  had  cost  the  English  tax- 
payer nine  millions  sterling.  The  lands,  out  of  which 
he  had  hoped,  in  part  at  least,  to  be  repaid,  had  been 
made  away  with  by  a  corrupt  commission  under  specious 
pretenses  of  rewards  for  invisible  service,  or,  if  rescued 
from  their  hands  by  the  intervention  of  the  Irish  Parlia- 
ment, rescued  only  to  be  restored  to  disloyal  noblemen, 
who  would  use  these  recovered  opportunities  to  cause 
fresh  trouble.  The  last  vote,  the  deliberate  refusal  of 
both  Lords  and  Commons  to  allow  a  test  of  allegiance 
there,  which  would  have  sifted  the  treacherous  from  the 
faithful,  destroyed  the  last  hope  of  dependence  on  the 
wretched,  uncertain,  discontented,  wavering  island  ; 
and  the  murmurs  of  the  English  clothiers,  who  had 
watched  her  extending  woollen  manufactures  with 
cowardly  jealousy,  found  willing  and  eager  listeners. 
This  Ireland,  with  her  harbors  and  rivers,  her  unnum- 
bered sheep  flocks,  fattened  on  her  limestone  pastures, 
producing  the  finest  fleeces  in  the  world  ;  this  nest  of  pop- 
ery and  sedition,  this  bottomless  morass  of  expense  and 
confusion,  was  to  hft  up  its  head  and  prosper,  tempt 
away  their  capital  and  their  workmen,  rob  England  of  the 
secret  of  her  wealth,  her  monopoly  in  the  world's  markets 

*  From  "  The  English  in  Ireland  in  the  Eighteenth  Century." 


EIGHTEENTH    CEXTUUV    POLITICAL    ECOKOMY.         ^57 

of  the  broadclotli,  frieze,  and  flannel  trade.  Had  tliese 
purblind  connnercial  politicians  known  what  belonged  to 
their  peace  thej  would  have  welcomed  the  development 
of  Irish  industry  as  a  better  guarantee  against  future 
trouble  than  a  hundred  acts  of  Parliament.  No  spirit 
could  have  more  effectually  killed  the  genius  of  popery 
arj^  Jacobitism,  or  could  have  more  surely  provided  that 
Ireland  should  nev-er  again  be  a  burden  on  the  English 
ex<!Tiequer,  than  the  growth  of  trade  and  manufacture 
there.  The  practical  intelligence,  the  fixed  and  orderly 
habits,  the  class  of  persons  who  would  have  been  attract- 
ed over  to  make  their  homes  where  land  was  cheap,  and 
waited  only  for  labor  and  capital  to  be  as  rich  and  fair  as 
tli^rir  own  English  counties,  these  things  would  have 
formed  the  links  of  an  invisible  chain,  which  could  never 
have  been  broken,  to  bind  the  t^vo  islands  into  one. 
Traders'  eyes  unhapj^ily  can  never  look  beyond  the  next 
year's  balance-sheet.  They  saw  their  artisans  emigrat- 
ing. They  saw,  or  thought  they  saw,  the  produce  of 
the  Irish  looms  competing  with  theirs  in  the  home 
market,  in  the  colonies,  and  on  the  Continent.  They 
imagined  their  business  stolen  from  them,  their  towns 
depopulated,  the  value  of  their  lands  decreased,  their 
country  itself  plunged  at  last  into  ruin,  all  for  the  sake 
of  that  miserable  spot  which  had  been  a  thorn  in  Eng- 
land's side  for  centuries. 

No  language  could  sufficiently  express  the  emotions  of 
the  exasperated  English  capitalist.  The  Parliament  was 
called  upon  "  to  make  the  Irish  remember  that  they  were 
concpiered."  They  sliould  not  l)o  allowed  to  build  or 
keep  at  sea  a  single  ship.  They  should  not  manufacture 
a  thing  except  their  linen,  and  their  commerce  should 
be  so  tied  and  bound,  that  they  should  interfere  with 
England   nowhere.       To    block   them   from    the  water 


258  SKETCHES   FKUM    J.   A,   FROUDE. 

altogether,  even  their  fishery,  "  must  be  with  men  and 
boats  from  Enghxnd. ' '  Their  Legislature,  of  which  they 
made  so  ill  ;i  use,  must  be  ended,  and  they  must  be  gov- 
erned by  the  Parliament  of  England.  So  argued  Eng- 
hsh  "common-sense."  In  vain  an  Irish  apologist  re- 
plied, that  to  imagine  Ireland's  competition  could  in- 
jure England  was  a  dream.  The  Irish  "seldom  sailed 
farther  than  a  potato  garden,"  and  traded  but  in  cows. 
They  "  knew  as  little  of  trade  and  navigation  as  the 
American  Indian.''  They  had  not  five  seamen  of  their 
nation,  and  not  one  ship  of  their  own  at  Dublin.  Such 
little  trade  as  they  had  was  carried  on  by  English  mer- 
chants and  on  English  account.  Good  sense  and  truth 
could  find  no  hearing  amid  the  general  clamor.  It  was 
not  enough  that  the  Navigation  x\ct  had  destroyed  the 
Irish  shipping  interest.  The  export  of  Irish  fleeces  to 
any  country  but  England  had  been  already  prohibited  ; 
but  the  restrictions  on  the  sale  of  the  raw  material  was  a 
temptation  to  the  Irish  to  work  it  up  at  home,  and  as 
long  as  they  might  export  their  blankets  and  their 
friezes,  England's  trade  was  in  danger  from  their  com- 
petition. The  English  manufacturers  considered  it  poli- 
tic and  fair  to  say  to  them,  "  You  shall  not  weave  yonr 
wool  at  home  at  all ;  you  shall  not  sell  your  woollen  cloth 
either  here  or  abroad  ;  we  will  put  you  under  such  disad- 
vantages that  it  shall  not  be  worth  your  while  to  supply 
your  own  necessities  ;  you  shall  buy  our  clothes  and 
frieze  to  clothe  your  own  backs  ;  you  shall  sell  your 
fleeces  only  to  us  ;  and,  as  it  is  our  interest  to  have  it  on 
easy  terms,  you  shall  take  the  prices  which  we  are 
pleased  to  off er. "  In  this  spirit  the  English  cloth  man- 
ufacturers addressed  themselves  to  their  own  Parlia- 
ment ;  and  Parliament,  blinded  by  ill-humor  and  preju- 
dice, indorsed  their  petition,  and  carried  it  to  the  King 


EIGHTEENTH    CENTUKY    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.        259 

in  language  in  wliicli  tlie  baseness  of  the  motive  was  dis- 
guised faintly  under  pretence  of  national  interest. 

The  Peers  represented  "that  the  growing  manufact- 
ure of  cloth  in  Ireland,  hy  cheapness  of  the  necessaries 
of  life,  and  goodness  of  materials,  invited  Englishmen 
with  their  families  and  servants  to  settle  there.  The 
Eihg^s  loyal  subjects  in  England  apprehended  the 
further  groM-th  of  it  would  prejudice  the  manufactures 
in 'England.  The  trade  of  England  would  decline,  the 
value  of  land  decrease,  and  the  number  of  the  people 
diminish.  They  besought  his  majesty  to  intimate  to  his 
Irish  subjects  that  the  growth  of  the  woollen  manufact- 
Tires  there  had  been  and  would  be  always  looked  upon 
wi^i  jealousy  in  England,  and,  if  not  timely  remedied, 
might  occasion  very  strict  laws  totally  to  prohibit  and 
suppress  the  same." 

The  Commons  said  that  the  "  wealth  and  power  of 
England  depended  on  her  preserving  a  monopoly  of  the 
woollen  manufactures.  They  looked  with  jealousy  on 
the  increase  of  it  elsewhere,  and  must  use  their  utmost 
endeavors  to  prevent  it  from  extending.  The  Irish  were 
dependent  on,  and  protected  by  England  in  the  enjoy- 
ment of  all  they  had,  and  the  English  Parliament  would 
be  obliged  to  interfere  imless  the  King  found  means  to 
make  Ireland  understand  its  position." 

Both  houses  insisted  that  the  Irish  woollen  trade  should 
cease.  The  Irish  linen  manufacture,  since  there  were 
for  the  present  no  rival  English  interests  with  which  it 
competed,  they  were  willing  to  leave  untouched,  and 
even  to  encourage.  Though  no  pledge  was  given,  there 
was  an  implied  compact  that  the  sacrifice  of  one  branch 
of  industry  should  be  compensated  by  the  protection  of 
the  other. 

The  King  replied   hiidly  that  the  wish  of  Parliament 


260  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

should  be  carried  out,  and  Ireland  was  invited  to  apply 
the  knife  to  her  own  throat.  Two  letters  from  William 
to  the  Lords  Justices  survive  in  Dublin  Castle,  embody- 
ing the  words  of  the  two  addresses,  and  recommending 
to  the  attention  of  the  Legislature  there  the  worst  and 
most  fatal  of  all  the  mistaken  legislative  experiments  to 
which  a  dependent  country  was  ever  subjected  by  the 
folly  of  its  superiors. 

The  Irish  Houses,  in  dread  of  abolition  if  they  re- 
fused, relying  on  the  j)romise  of  encouragement  to  tlieir 
linen  trade,  and  otherwise  unable  to  help  themselves, 
acquiesced.  They  laid  an  export  duty  of  four  shillings 
in  the  pound  on  all  broadcloths  carried  out  of  Ireland, 
and  half  as  much  on  kerseys,  flannels,  and  friezes, 
amounting  in  itself  to  a  complete  prohibition  ;  while,  to 
make  assurance  more  sure,  the  English  Parliament  passed 
an  act  prohibiting  the  export  out  of  Ireland  of  either 
wool  or  woollen  manufactures  to  any  country  but  Eng- 
land, to  any  port  in  England  except  six  on  St.  George's 
Channel,  and  only  from  the  six  towns  of  Dublin,  Water- 
ford,  Youghal,  Kingsdale,  Cork,  and  Waterford. 

The  belief  that,  with  a  coast-line  like  that  of  Ireland, 
and  with  a  population  which  they  were  punishing  for 
disloyalty,  such  restrictions  could  really  be  enforced, 
was  one  of  those  illusions  which  only  the  intellect  of  an 
English  merchant  could  have  entertained.  The  result  of 
this  restriction  was  to  convert  the  Irish,  beyond  their 
other  troublesome  peculiarities,  into  a  nation  of  smug- 
glers. 

How  far  England  adhered  to  the  linen  compact  will 
be  told  in  its  place.  For  the  present,  Mr.  Hely  Hutch- 
ingson's  summary  of  the  story  will  suffice  : 

"  It  is  true  you  promised,  in  return  for  the  restraint, 
to  encourage  our  linen  manufacture.      But  how  have 


EIQHTEEJfTH    CENTURY    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.         261 

you  done  it  ?  By  giving  large  bounties  for  the  making 
coarse  linen  in  the  Highlands  of  Scotland — bounties  on 
the  exportation  of  English  linen — opening  the  linen 
manufacture  to  all  persons  without  serving  apprentice- 
ships, and  imposing  a  tax  of  thirty  per  cent  on  all  for- 
eign linens,  which  has  been  construed  to  extend  to  Irish 
prftited,  stained,  dyed,  striped,  or  chequered." 

"  Will  you,"  Hut chingson  asked,  with  j)rophetic  in- 
dignation, "  will  you  liav^e  an  increased  population  em- 
ployed at  home,  where  they  will  contribute  to  the  wealth 
and  strength  of  the  state  ;  or  shall  they  emigrate  to 
America,  where  it  is  possible  they  may  assist  in  dismem- 
bering the  British  empire  ?" 


XL 

KEYNAKD  THE  FOX. 

Lord  Macaulay,  in  liis  Essay  on  Machiavelli,  pro- 
pounds a  singular  theory.  Declining  the  various  solu- 
tions which  have  been  offered  to  explain  how  a  man  sup- 
posed to  be  so  great  could  have  lent  his  genius  to  the 
doctrine  of  "  the  Prince,"  he  has  advanced  a  hypothesis 
of  his  own,  which  may  or  may  not  be  true,  as  an  inter- 
pretation of  Macliiavelli's  character,  but  which,  as  an 
exposition  of  a  universal  ethical  theory,  is  as  question- 
able as  what  it  is  brought  forward  to  explain.  We  will 
not  show  Lord  Macaulay  the  disrespect  of  supposing  that 
he  has  attempted  an  elaborate  piece  of  irony.  It  is  pos- 
sible that  he  may  have  been  exercising  his  genius  with  a 
paradox,  but  the  subject  is  not  of  the  sort  in  which  we 
can  patiently  permit  such  exercises.  It  is  hard  work 
with  all  of  us  to  keep  ourselves  straight,  even  when  we 
see  the  road  with  all  plainness  as  it  hes  out  before  us  ; 
and  clever  men  must  be  good  enough  to  find  something 
else  to  amuse  themselves  with,  instead  of  dusting  our 
eyes  with  sophistry. 

According  to  this  conception  of  human  nature,  the 
basenesses  and  the  excellences  of  mankind  are  no  more 
than  accidents  of.  circumstance,  the  results  of  national 
feeling  and  national  capabilities  ;  and  cunning  and 
treachery,  and  lying,  and  such  other  "  natural  defences 
of  the  weak  against  the  strong,"  are  in  themselves 
neither  good  nor  bad,  except  as  thinking  makes  them  so. 


REYXARl)   THE    FOX.  263 

They  are  the  virtues  of  a  weak  people,  and  they  will 
be  as  much  admired,  and  are  as  justly  admirable  ;  j;hey 
are  to  the  full  as  compatible  with  the  highest  graces  and 
most  lofty  features  of  the  heart  and  intellect,  as  any  of 
those  opposite  so-called  heroisms  which  we  are  generally 
SQ  unthinking  as  to  allow  to  monopolize  the  name. 
Onnning  is  the  only  resource  of  the  feeble  ;  and  why 
may  we  not  feel  for  victorious  cunning  as  strong  a  sym- 
pathy as  for  the  bold,  downright,  open  bearing  of  the 
strong  ?  That  there  may  be  no  mistake  in  the  essayist's 
meaning,  that  he  may  drive  the  nail  home  into  the  Eng- 
lish understanding,  he  takes  an  illustration  which  shall 
be  familiar  to  all  of  us  in  the  characters  of  lago  and 
O^iello.  To  our  northern  thought,  the  free  and  noble 
nature  of  the  Moor  is  wrecked  through  a  single  in- 
firmity, by  a  fiend  in  the  human  form.  To  one  of 
Machiavelli's  Italians,  lago's  keen-edged  intellect  would 
have  appeared  as  admirable  as  Othello's  daring  appears 
to  us,  and  Othello  himself  little  better  than  a  fool  and  a 
savage.  It  is  but  a  change  of  scene,  of  climate,  of  the 
animal  qualities  of  the  frame,  and  evil  has  become  good, 
and  good  has  become  evil.  Kow,  our  displeasure  with 
Lord  Macaulay  is,  not  that  he  has  advanced  a  novel  and 
mischievous  theory  :  it  was  elaborated  long  ago  in  the 
finely -tempered  dialectics  of  the  Schools  of  Rhetoric  at 
Athens  ;  and  so  long  as  such  a  phenomenon  as  a  culti- 
vated rogue  remains  possible  among  mankind,  it  will 
reappear  in  all  languages  and  under  any  number  of 
philosophical  disguises.  Seldom  or  never,  however,  has 
it  appeared  with  so  little  attempt  at  disguise.  It  has 
been  left  for  questionable  poets  and  novelists  to  idealize 
the  rascal  genus  ;  philosophers  have  escaped  into  the 
ambiguities  of  general  propositions,  and  we  do  not  re- 
member elsewhere  to  have  met  with  a  serious  ethical 


264  SKETCHES    FROM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

thinker  deliberately  laying  two  whole  organic  char- 
acters, with  their  vices  and  virtues  in  full  life  and 
bloom,  side  by  side,  asking  himself  which  is  best,  and 
answering  gravely  that  it  is  a  matter  of  taste. 

Lord  Macaulay  has  been  bolder  than  his  predecessors  ; 
he  has  shrunk  from  no  conclusion,  and  has  looked 
directly  into  the  very  heart  of  the  matter  ;  he  has 
struck,  as  we  believe,  the  very  lowest  stone  of  our  ethical 
convictions,  and  declared  that  the  foundation  quakes 
under  it. 

For,  ultimately,  how  do  we  know  that  right  is  right, 
and  wi'ong  is  wrong  ?  People  in  general  accept  it  on 
authority  ;  but  authority  itself  must  repose  on  some 
ulterior  basis  ;  and  what  is  that  ?  Are  we  to  say  that  in 
morals  there  is  a  system  of  primary  axioms,  out  of  which 
we  develop  our  conclusions,  and  apply  them,  as  they 
are  needed,  to  life  ?  It  does  not  appear  so.  The 
analogy  of  morals  is  rather  with  art  than  with  geometry. 
The  grace  of  Heaven  gives  us  good  men,  and  gives  us 
beautiful  creations  ;  and,  we  perceiving  by  the  instincts 
within  ourselves  that  celestial  presence  in  the  objects 
on  which  we  gaze,  find  out  for  ourselves  the  laws  which 
make  them  what  they  are,  not  by  comparing  them  with 
any  antecedent  theory,  but  by  careful  analysis  of  our  own 
impressions,  by  asking  ourselves  what  it  is  which  we 
admire  in  them,  and  by  calling  that  good,  and  calling 
that  beautiful. 

So,  then,  if  admiration  be  the  first  fact — if  the  sense 
of  it  be  the  ultimate  ground  on  which  the  after  temple 
of  morality,  as  a  system,  upraises  itself — if  we  can  be 
challenged  here  on  our  own  ground,  and  fail  to  make  it 
good,  what  we  call  the  life  of  the  soul  becomes  a  dream 
of  a  feeble  enthusiast,  and  we  moralists  a  mark  for  the 
sceptic's  finger  to  point  at  with  scorn. 


REYNARD   THE    FOX.  2G5 

Bold  and  ablj-iirged  arguments  against  our  own  con- 
victions, if  they  do  not  confuse  us,  will  usually  send  us 
back  over  our  ground  to  re-examine  the  strength  of  our 
positions  ;  and  if  we  are  honest  with  ourselves,  we  shall 
very  often  find  points  of  some  uncertainty  left  unguarded, 
of  which  the  show  of  the  strength  of  our  enemy  will 
«obhge  us  to  see  better  to  the  defence.  It  was  not  with- 
out some  shame,  and  much  uneasiness,  that,  while  we 
w€re  ourselves  engaged  in  this  process,  full  of  indigna- 
tion with  Lord  Macaulay,  we  heard  a  clear  voice  ringing 
in  our  ear.  "  Who  art  thou  that  judgest  another  ?"  and 
warning  us  of  the  presence  in  our  own  heart  of  a  sym- 
pathy which  we  could  not  ''  deny,"  with  the  sadly  ques- 
tionable hero  of  the  German  epic,  "  Reynard  the  Fox." 
With  our  vulpine  friend,  we  were  on  the  edge  of  the 
very  same-tibyss,  if,  indeed,  we  were  not  rolling  in  the 
depth  of  it.  By  what  sophistry  could  we  justify  our- 
selves, if  not  by  the  very  same  which  we  had  just  been 
so  eagerly  condemning  ?  And  our  conscience  whispered 
to  us  that  we  had  been  swift  to  detect  a  fault  in  another, 
because  it  was  the  very  fault  to  which,  in  our  own  heart 
of  hearts,  we  had  a  latent  leaning. 

Was  it  so  indeed,  then  ?  Was  Reineke  no  better  than 
lago  ?  Was  the  sole  difference  between  them,  that  the 
vates  sacer  who  had  sung  the  exploits  of  Reineke  loved 
the  wicked  rascal,  and  entangled  us  in  loving  him  ?  It 
was  a  question  to  be  asked.  And  yet  we  had  faith 
enougli  in  the  straightforwardness  of  our  own  sympatliies 
to  feel  sure  that  it  must  admit  of  some  sort  of  answer. 
And,  indeed,  we  rapidly  found  an  answer  satisfactory 
enough  to  give  us  time  to  breathe,  in  remembering  that 
Reineke,  with  all  his  roguery,  has  no  malice  in  him.  It 
is  not  in  his  nature  to  liate  ;  he  could  not  do  it  if  he 
tried.     The  characteristic  of  lago  is  that  deep  motiveless 


266  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

malignity  which  rejoices  in  evil  as  its  proper  element — 
Avhicli  loves  evil  as  good  men  love  virtue.  In  calcula- 
tions on  the  character  of  the  Moor,  lago  despises 
Othello's  unsuspicious  trustingness  as  imbecility,  while 
he  hates  him  as  a  man  because  his  nature  is  the  per- 
petual, opposite  and  perpetual  reproach  of  his  own. 
l^ow,  Reineke  would  not  have  hurt  a  creature,  not  even 
Scharfenebbe,  the  crowd's  wife,  when  she  came  to  peck 
his  eyes  out,  if  he  had  not  been  hungry  ;  and  that 
yaorpdg  dvdyKT],  that  craving  of  the  stomach,  makes  a 
difference  quite  infinite.  It  is  true  that,  like  lago, 
Keineke  rejoices  in  the  exercise  of  his  intellect  :  the 
sense  of  his  power  and  the  scientific  employment  of  his 
time  are  a  real  delight  to  him  ;  but  then,  as  we  said,  he 
does  not  love  evil  for  its  own  sake  ;  he  is  only  somewhat 
indifferent  to  it.  If  the  other  animals  venture  to  take 
liberties  with  him,  he  will  repay  them  in  their  own  coin, 
and  get  his  quiet  laugh  at  them  at  the  same  time  ;  but 
the  object  generally  for  W'hich  he  lives  is  the  natural  one 
of  getting  his  bread  for  himself  and  his  family  ;  and,  as 
the  great  moralist  says,  "  It  is  better  to  be  bad  for  some- 
thing than  for  nothing.' '  Badness  generally  is  undesira- 
ble ;  but  badness  in  its  essence,  which  may  be  called 
heroic  badness,  is  gratuitous. 

But  this  first  thought  served  merely  to  give  us  a  mo- 
mentary relief  from  our  alarm,  and  we  determined  we 
would  sift  the  matter  to  the  bottom,  and  no  more  expose 
ourselves  to  be  taken  at  such  disadvantage.  We  went 
again  to  the  poem,  with  our  eyes  open,  and  our  moral 
sense  as  keenly  awake  as  a  genuine  wish  to  understand 
our  feelings  could  make  it.  We  determined  that  we 
would  really  know  what  we  did  feel  and  what  we  did 
not.  We  would  not  be  lightly  scared  away  from  our 
friend,  but  neither  would  we  any  more  allow  our  judg- 


REYXARD   THE    FOX.  267 

merit  to  be  talked  down  by  that  fluent  tongue  of  his  ; 
he  should  have  justice  from  us,  he  and  his  biographer,  as 
far  as  it  lay  with  us  to  discern  justice  and  to  render  it. 

And  really  on  this  deliberate  perusal  it  did  seem  little 
less  than  impossible  that  we  could  find  any  conceivable 
attribute  illustrated  in  Reineke's  proceedings  which  we 
-pould  dare  to  enter  in  our  catalogue  of  virtues,  and 
hot  blush  to  read  it  there.  What  sin  is  there  in  the 
J)ecalogue  in  which  he  has  not  steeped  himself  to  the 
lips  ?  To  the  lips,  shall  we  say  ?  nay,  over  head  and  ears 
• — rolling  and  rollicking  in  sin.  Murder,  and  theft,  and 
adultery  ;  sacrilege,  perjury,  lying — his  very  life  is  made 
of  them.  On  he  goes  to  the  end,  heaping  crime  on 
'  crime,  and  lie  on  lie,  and  at  last  when  it  seems  that  jus- 
■  tice,  which  has  been  so  long  vainly  halting  after  him, 
has  him  really  in  her  iron  grasp,  there  is  a  solemn  appeal 
to  Heaven,  a  challenge,  a  battle  ordeal,  in  which,  by 
means  we  may  not  venture  even  to  whisper,  the  villain 
prospers,  and  comes  out  glorious,  victorious,  amid  the 
applause  of  a  gazing  world.  To  cro\vn  it  all,  the  poet 
tells  us  that  under  the  disguise  of  the  animal  name  and 
form  the  world  of  man  is  represented,  and  the  true  course 
of  it  ;  and  the  idea  of  the  book  is,  that  we  who  read  it 
may  learn  therein  to  discern  between  good  and  evil,  and 
choose  the  first  and  avoid  the  last.  It  seemed  beyond 
the  power  of  sophistry  to  whitewash  Reinekc,  and  the 
interest  which  still  continued  to  cling  to  him  seemed  too 
nearly  to  resemble  the  unwisdom  of  the  multitude,  with 
whom  success  is  the  one  virtue,  and  failure  the  only 
crime. 

It  appeared,  too,  that  although  the  animal  disguises 
were  too  transparent  to  endure  a  moment's  reflection, 
yet  that  they  were  so  gracefully  worn  that  such  mo- 
ment's reflection  was  not  to  be  come  at  without  an  effort. 


268  SKETCHES    FEOM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

Our  imagination  following  the  costume,  did  impercepti- 
bly betray  our  judgment  ;  we  admired  the  human  in- 
tellect, the  ever-ready  prompt  sagacity  and  presence  of 
mind.  We  delighted  in  the  satire  on  the  foolishnesses 
and  greedinesses  of  our  own  fellow-creatures  ;  but  in  our 
regard  for  the  hero  we  forgot  his  humanity  wherever  it 
was  his  interest  that  w^e  should  forget  it,  and  while  we 
admired  him  as  a  man  we  judged  him  only  as  a  fox. 
We  doubt  whether  it  would  have  been  possible,  if  he  had 
been  descril:)ed  as  an  open  acknowledged  biped  in  coat 
and  trousers,  to  have  retained  our  regard  for  him. 
Something  or  other  in  us,  either  real  rightmindedness, 
or  humbug,  or  hypocrisy,  would  have  obliged  us  to  mix 
more  censure  wath  our  liking  than  most  of  us  do  in  the 
case  as  it  stands.  It  may  be  that  the  dress  of  the  fox 
throws  us  off  our  guard,  and  lets  out  a  secret  or  two 
which  we  commonly  conceal  even  from  ourselves, 
AVhen  we  have  to  pass  an  opinion  upon  bad  people,  who 
at  the  same  time  are  clever  and  attractive,  we  say  rather 
what  we  think  that  we  ought  to  feel  than  what  we  feel 
in  reality  ;  while  with  Reineke,  being  but  an  animal,  we 
forget  to  make  ourselves  up,  and  for  once  our  genuine 
tastes  show  themselves  freely.  Some  degree  of  truth 
there  undoubtedly  is  in  this.  But  making  all  allowance 
for  it — making  all  and  over  allowance  for  the  trick  which 
is  passed  upon  our  senses,  there  still  remained  a  feeling 
unresolved.  The  poem  was  not  solely  the  apotheosis  of 
a  rascal  in  w^hom  we  were  betrayed  into  taking  an  interest  ; 
and  it  was  not  a  satire  merely  on  the  world,  and  on  the 
men  whom  the  world  delight  to  honor.  There  was  still 
something  which  really  deserved  to  be  liked  in  Reineke, 
and  what  it  was  we  had  as  yet  failed  to  discover. 

"  Two  are  better  than  one,"  and  we  resolved  in  our 
difficulty  to  try  what    our  friends  might  have  to  say 


REYNARD   THE    FOX.  2G9 

about  it.  The  appearance  of  the  Wiirtemberg  animals 
at  the  Exliibition  came  fortunately  apropos  to  our  assist- 
ance :  a  few  years  ago  it  was  rare  to  find  a  person  who 
had  read  the  Fox  Epic  ;  and  still  more,  of  course,  to  find 
one  whose  judgment  would  be  worth  taking  about  it. 
But  now  the  charming  figures  of  Reineke  himself,  and 

";the  Lion  King,  and  Isegrim,  and  Bruin,  and  Bellyn,  and 
Hintze,  and  Grimbart,  had  set  all  the  world  asking  who 

/:aiid  what  they  were,  and  the  story  began  to  get  itself 

.  inown.     The  old  editions,  which  had  long  slept  unbound 

in  reams  upon  the  shelv^es,  began  to  descend  and  clothe 

themselves  in  green  and  crimson.     Mr.   Dickens  sent  a 

summary  of  it  round  the  households  of  England.     Every- 

^body  began  to  talk  of  Reineke  ;  and  now,  at  any  rate,  we 
said  to  ourselves,  we  shall  see  whether  we  are  alone  in 
our  likin^^^whether  others  share  in  this  strange  sym- 
pathy, or  whether  it  be  some  unique  and  monstrous 
moral  obliquity  in  ourselves. 

We  set  to  work,  therefore,  with  all  earnestness,  feeling 
our  way  first  with  fear  and  delicacy,  as  conscious  of  our 
own  delinquency,  to  gather  judgments  which  should  be 
wiser  than  our  own,  and  correct  ourselves,  if  it  jjroved 
that  we  required  correction,  with  whatever  severity 
might  be  necessary.  The  result  of  this  labor  of  ours  was 
not  a  little  surprising.  AVe  found  that  women  invariably, 
with  that  clear  moral  instinct  of  theirs,  at  once  utterly 
reprobated  and  detested  our  poor  Reynard  ;  detested  the 
hero  and  detested  the  bard  who  sang  of  him  with  so 
much  sympathy  ;  while  men  we  found  almost  invariably 
feeling  just  as  we  felt  ourselves,  only  with  this  difference, 
that  we  saw  no  trace  of  uneasiness  in  them  about  the 
matter.  It  was  no  little  comfort  to  us,  moreover,  to  find 
that  the  exceptions  were  rather  among  the  half -men,  the 
M'ould-be  extremely  good,  but  whose   goodness  was  of 


270  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

that  dead  and  passive  kind  which  spoke  to  but  a  small 
elevation  of  thought  or  activity  ;  while  just  in  propor- 
tion as  a  man  was  strong,  and  real,  and  energetic,  was  his 
ability  to  see  good  in  Reineke.  It  was  really  most 
strange  :  one  near  friend  of  ours — a  man  who,  as  far  as 
we  knew  (and  we  knew  him  well),  had  never  done  a 
wrong  thing — when  we  ventured  to  hint  something  about 
roguery,  replied,  "  You  see,  he  was  such  a  clever  rogue, 
that  he  had  a  riglit."  Another,  whom  we  pressed  more 
closely  with  that  treacherous  cannibal  feast  at  Malepartus, 
on  the  body  of  poor  Lampe,  said  off-hand  and  with  much 
impatience  of  such  questioning,  "  Such  fellows  were 
made  to  be  eaten."  What  could  we  do  ?  It  had  come 
to  this  ;  as  in  the  exuberance  of  our  pleasure  with 
some  dear  child,  no  ordinary  epithet  will  sometimes 
reach  to  express  the  vehemence  of  our  affection,  and 
borrowing  language  out  of  the  opposites,  we  call  him 
little  rogue  or  little  villain,  so  here,  reversing  the  terras 
of  the  analogy,  we  bestow  the  fulness  of  our  regard  on 
Reineke  because  of  that  transcendently  successful 
roguery. 

When  we  asked  our  friends  how  they  came  to  feel  as 
they  did,  they  had  httle  to  say.  They  were  not  persons 
who  could  be  suspected  of  any  latent  disposition  toward 
evil-doing  ;  and  yet  though  it  appeared  as  if  they  were 
falHng  under  the  description  of  those  unhappy  ones  who, 
if  they  did  not  such  things  themselves,  yet  "  had  pleas- 
ure in  those  who  did  them,"  they  did  not  care  to  justify 
themselves.  Tlie  fact  was  so  :  dpx^]  to  oti  :  it  was  a 
fact — what  could  we  want  more  ?  Some  few  attempted 
feebly  to  maintain  that  the  book  was  a  satire.  But  this 
only  moved  the  difficulty  a  single  step  ;  for  the  fact  of 
the  sympathy  remained  unimpaired,  and  if  it  was  a 
satire  we  were  ourselves  the  objects  of  it.     Others  urged 


REYNARD    THE    FOX.  271 

what  we  said  above,  that  the  story  was  only  of  poor 
animals  that,  according  to  Descartes,  not  only  had  no 
souls,  but  scarcely  had  even  life  in  any  original  and 
sufficient  sense,  and  therefore  we  need  not  trouble  our- 
selves. But  one  of  two  alternatives  it  seemed  we  were 
bound  to  choose,  either  of  which  was  fatal  to  the  pro- 
■TDOsed  escape.  Either  there  was  a  man  hiding  under  the 
fox's  skin  ;  or  else,  if  real  foxes  have  such  brains  as 
Reineke  was  furnished  withal,  no  honest  doubt  could  be 
entertained  that  some  sort  of  conscience  was  not  forgotten 
in  the  compounding  of  him,  and  he  must  be  held 
answerable  according  to  his  knowledge. 

What  would  Mr.  Carlyle  say  of  it,  we  thought,  with 
^lis  might  and  right  ?  ' '  The  just  thing  in  the  long  run 
is  the  strong  thing. "  But  Reineke  had  along  runout 
and  came  hi  winner.  Does  he  only  "  seem  to  succeed  "? 
"Who  does  succeed,  then,  if  he  no  more  than  seems  ? 
The  vulpine  intellect  knows  where  the  geese  live,  it  is 
elsewhere  said  ;  but  among  Reineke's  victims  we  do  not 
remember  one  goose,  in  the  literal  sense  of  goose  ;  and 
as  to  geese  metaphorical,  the  whole  visible  world  lies 
down  complacently  at  his  feet.  Nor  does  Mr.  Carlyle's 
expressed  language  on  this  very  poem  serve  any  better 
to  help  us — nay,  it  seems  as  if  he  feels  uneasy  in  the 
neighborhood  of  so  strong  a  rascal,  so  briefly  he  dis- 
misses him.  "  Worldly  prudence  is  the  only  virtue 
which  is  certain  of  its  reward. "  Nay,  but  there  is  more 
in  it  than  that  :  no  worldly  prudence  would  command 
the  voices  which  have  been  given  in  to  us  for  ReiTieke. 

Three  only  possibilities  lay  now  before  us  :  either  we 
should,  on  searching,  hnd  something  solid  in  the  Fox's 
doings  to  justify  success  ;  or  else  the  just  thing  was  not 
always  the  strong  thing  ;  or  it  might  be,  that  such  very 
semblance    of    success    was   itself    the    most    miserable 


272  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDB. 

failure  ;  that  the  wicked  man  who  was  struck  down  and 
foiled,  and  foiled  again,  till  he  unlearned  his  wickedness, 
or  till  he  was  disabled  from  any  more  attempting  it,  was 
blessed  in  his  disappointment  ;  that  to  triumph  in 
wickedness,  and  to  continue  in  it  and  to  prosper  to  the 
end,  was  the  last,  worse  penalty  inflicted  by  the  Divine 
vengeance.  "Iv'  dOdvarog  xi  ddiKog  u)v — to  go  on  with  in- 
justice through  this  world  and  through  all  eternity,  un- 
cleansed  by  any  purgatorial  fire,  untaught  by  any  un- 
toward consequence  to  open  his  eyes  and  to  see  in  its  true 
accursed  form  the  miserable  demon  to  which  he  has  sold 
himself — this,  of  all  catastrophes  which  could  befall  an 
evil  man,  was  the  deepest,  lowest,  and  most  savoring  of 
hell,  which  the  purest  of  the  Grecian  moralists  could 
reason  out  for  himself — under  which  third  hypothesis 
many  an  uneasy  misgiving  would  vanish  away,  and  Mr. 
Carlyle's  broad  aphorism  might  be  accepted  by  us  with 
thankfulness. 

It  appeared,  therefore,  at  any  rate,  to  have  come  to 
this — that  if  we  wanted  a  solution  for  our  sphinx 
enigma,  no  (Edipus  was  likely  to  rise  and  find  it  for  us  ; 
and  that  if  we  wanted  help,  we  must  take  it  for  ourselves. 
This  only  we  found,  that  if  we  sinned  in  our  regard 
for  the  unworthy  animal,  we  shared  our  sin  with  the 
largest  number  of  our  own  sex.  Comforted  with  the 
sense  of  good-fellowship,  we  went  boldly  to  work  upon 
our  conscionsness  ;  and  the  imperfect  analysis  which  we 
.succeeded  in  accomj)lishing,  we  here  lay  before  you, 
whoever  you  may  be,  who  have  felt,  as  we  have  felt,  a 
regard  which  was  a  moral  disturbance  to  you,  and  which 
you  will  be  pleased  if  we  enable  you  to  justify — 

Si  quid  novisti  rectius  istis, 
Candidus  imperti ;  si  non,  his  utere  niecum. 


REYNARD   THE    FOX.  273 

Following  the  clew  which  was  thrust  into  our  hand  by 
the  marked  difiference  of  the  feelings  of  men  upon  the 
subject  from  those  of  women,  we  were  at  once  satisfied 
that  Reineke's  goodness,  if  he  had  any,  must  lay  rather 
in  the  active  than  the  passive  department  of  life.  The 
negative  obedience  to  prohibitory  precepts,  under  which 
:sC^men  are  bound  as  well  as  men,  as  was  already  too 
clear,  we  were  obliged  to  surrender  as  hopeless.  But  it 
seemed  as  if,  with  respect  to  men,  whose  business  is  to 
(JOy  and  to  labor,  and  to  accomplish,  this  negative  test 
was  a  seriously  imperfect  one  ;  and  it  was  quite  as  possi- 
ble that  a  man  who  unhappily  had  broken  many  pro- 
hibitions might  yet  exhibit  positive  excellences,  as  that 
h^  might  walk  through  life  picking  his  way  with  the 
utmost  assiduity,  risking  nothing  and  doing  nothing, 
not  committiTlg  a  single  sin,  but  keeping  his  talent  care- 
fully wrapped  up  in  a  napkin,  and  get  sent,  in  the  end,  to 
outer  darkness  for  his  pains,  as  an  unprofitable  servant. 
And  this  appeared  the  more  important  to  us,  as  it  was 
very  little  dwelt  upon  by  religious  or  moral  teachers  :  at 
the  end  of  six  thousand  years,  the  popular  notion  of 
virtue,  as  far  as  it  could  get  itself  expressed,  liad  not 
risen  beyond  the  mere  abstinence  from  certain  specific 
bad  actions. 

The  king  of  the  beasts  forgives  Reineke  on  account  of 
the  substantial  services  which  at  various  times  he  has 
rendered.  His  counsel  was  always  the  wisest,  his  hand 
the  promptest  in  cases  of  difficulty  ;  and  all  that 
dexterity,  and  politeness,  and  courtesy,  and  exquisite 
culture  had  not  been  learned  without  an  effort,  or  with- 
out conquering  many  undesirable  tendencies  in  himself. 
Men  are  not  born  with  any  art  in  its  perfection,  and 
Reineke  had  made  liimself  valuable  by  his  own  sagacity 
and  exertion.      Now,   on  the  human  stage,  a  man  who 


274  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

has  made  himself  valuable  is  certain  to  be  valued.  How- 
ever we  may  pretend  to  estimate  men  according  to  the 
wrong  things  which  they  have  done,  or  abstained  from 
doing,  we  in  fact  follow  the  example  of  Nobel,  the  king 
of  the  beasts  ;  we  give  them  their  places  among  us  ac- 
cording to  the  serviceableness  and  capability  which  they 
display.  We  might  mention  not  a  few  eminent  public 
servants,  whom  the  world  delights  to  honor — ministers, 
statesmen,  lawyers,  men  of  science,  artists,  poets, 
soldiers — who,  if  they  were  tried  by  the  negative  test, 
would  show  but  a  poor  figure  ;  yet  their  value  is  too 
real  to  be  dispensed  with  ;  and  we  tolerate  unquestion- 
able wrong  to  secure  tlie  services  of  eminent  ability. 
The  world  really  does  this,  and  it  always  has  really  done 
it  from  the  beginning  of  the  human  history  ;  and  it  is 
only  indolence  or  cowardice  which  has  left  our  ethical 
teaching  halting  so  far  behind  the  universal  and  necessary 
practice.  Even  questionable  prima  donnas,  in  virtue  of 
their  sweet  voices,  have  their  praises  hymned  in  drawing- 
room  and  newspaper,  and  applause  rolls  over  them,  and 
gold  and  bouquets  shower  on  them  from  lips  and  hands 
which,  except  for  those  said  voices,  would  treat  them  to 
a  ruder  reward.  In  real  fact,  we  take  our  places  in  this 
world,  not  according  to  what  we  are  not,  but  according 
to  what  we  are.  His  Holiness  Pope  Clement,  when 
his  audience-room  rang  with  furious  outcries  for  justice 
on  Benvenuto  Cellini,  who,  as  far  as  half-a-dozen  mur- 
ders could  form  a  title,  was  as  fair  a  candidate  for  the 
gallows  as  ever  swung  from  that  unlucky  wood,  replied, 
"  All  this  is  very  well,  gentlemen  ;  these  murders  are 
bad  things,  we  know  that.  But  where  am  I  to  get 
another  Benvenuto  if  yon  hang  this  one  for  me  ?" 

Or,   to  take  an  acknowledged  hero,   one  of  the  old 
Greek  sort,  the  theme  of  the  song  of  the  greatest  of 


BEYNARD   THE   POX.  275 

human  poets,  whom  it  is  less  easy  to  refuse  to  admire 
than  even  our  friend  Reineke.  Take  Ulysses.  It  can- 
not be  said  that  he  kept  his  hands  from  taking  what  was 
not  his,  or  his  tongue  from  speaking  what  was  not  true  ; 
and  if  Frau  Ermelyn  had  to  complain  (as  indeed  there 
was  too  much  reason  for  her  complaining)  of  certain  in- 
Irrmities  in  her  good  husband  Reineke,  Penelope,  too, 
might  have  urged  a  thing  or  two,  if  she  had  known  as 
much  about  the  matter  as  we  know,  which  the  modern 
moralist  would  find  It  hard  to  excuse. 

After  all  is  said,  the  capable  man  is  the  man  to  be 
admired.  The  man  who  tries  and  fails,  what  is  the  use 
of  him  ?  We  are  in  this  world  to  do  something — not  to 
fa^l  in  doing  it.  Of  your  bunglers — helpless,  inefficient 
persons,  "  unfit  alike  for  good  or  ill,"  who  try  one  thing, 
and  fail  because  they  are  not  strong  enough,  and 
another,  because  they  have  not  energy  enough,  and  a 
third,  because  they  have  no  talent — inconsistent,  un- 
stable, and  therefore  never  to  excel,  what  shall  we  say  of 
them  ?  what  use  is  there  in  them  ?  what  hope  is  there  of 
them  ?  what  can  wu  wish  for  them  ?  ro  firj-rror'  elvai  ttclvt' 
dpiarov.  It  were  better  for  them  they  had  never  been 
born.  To  be  able  to  do  what  a  man  tries  to  do,  that  is 
the  first  requisite  ;  and  given  that,  we  may  hope  all 
things  for  him.  ''  Hell  is  paved  with  good  intentions," 
the  proverb  says  ;  and  the  enormous  jjroportion  of  bad 
successes  in  this  life  lie  between  the  desire  and  the  execu- 
tion. Give  us  a  man  who  is  able  to  do  what  he  settles 
that  he  desires  to  do,  and  we  have  the  one  thing  indis- 
pensal)le.  If  he  can  succeed  doing  ill,  much  more  he 
can  succeed  doing  well.  Sliow  him  better,  and,  at  any 
rate,  there  is  a  chance  that  he  will  do  better. 

We  are  not  concerned  here  with  Renvenuto  or  witli 
Ulysses  further  than  to  show,  through  the  position  which 


270  SKETCHES    FROxM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

we  all  consent  to  give  them,  that  there  is  much  un- 
reality in  our  conmion  moral  talk,  against  which  we  must 
be  on  our  guard.  And  if  we  fling  off  an  old  friend,  and 
take  to  affecting  a  hatred  of  him  which  we  do  not  feel, 
we  have  scarcely  gained  by  the  exchange,  even  though 
originally  our  friendship  may  have  been  misplaced. 

Capability  no  one  will  deny  to  Reineke.  That  is  the 
very  differentia  of  him.  An  "  animal  capable"  would 
be  his  sufficient  definition.  Here  is  another  very 
genuinely  valuable  feature  about  him — his  wonderful 
singleness  of  character.  Lying,  treacherous,  cunning 
scoundrel  as  he  is,  there  is  a  wholesome  absence  of 
humbug  about  him.  Cheating  all  the  world,  he  never 
cheats  himself  ;  and  while  he  is  a  hypocrite,  he  is 
always  a  conscious  hypocrite — a  form  of  character, 
however  paradoxical  it  may  seem,  a  great  deal  more 
accessible  to  good  influences  than  the  other  of  the  un- 
conscious sort.  Ask  Reineke  for  tlie  principles  of  his 
life,  and  if  it  suited  his  purpose  to  tell  you,  he  could  do 
so  with  the  greatest  exactness.  There  would  be  no  dis- 
crepancy between  the  profession  and  the  practice.  He 
is  most  truly  single-minded,  and  therefore  stable  in  his 
ways,  and  therefore,  as  the  world  goes,  and  in  the  world's 
sense,  successful.  Whether  really  successful  is  a  ques- 
tion we  do  not  care  here  to  enter  on  ;  but  only  to  say 
this — that  of  all  unsuccessful  men  in  every  sense,  either 
divine,  or  human,  or  devilish,  there  is  none  equal  to 
Bunyan's  Mr.  Facing-both-ways — the  fellow  with  one 
eye  on  heaven  and  one  on  earth — who  sincerely  preaches 
one  thing,  and  sincerely  does  another  ;  and  from  the 
intensity  of  his  unreality  is  unal)le  either  to  see  or  feel 
the  contradiction.  Serving  God  with  his  lips,  and  with 
the  half  of  his  mind  which  is  not  bound  up  in  the  world, 
and  serving  the  devil  with  his  actions,  and  with  the  other 


REYNARD   THE   FOX.  277 

half,  he  is  substantially  trying  to  cheat  both  God  and  the 
devil,  and  is,  in  fact,  only  cheating  himself  and  his 
neighbors.  This,  of  all  characters  upon  the  earth,  ap- 
pears to  us  to  be  the  one  of  whom  there  is  no  hope  at  all 
... — a  character  becoming,  in  these  days,  alarmingly  abnn- 
'dant ;  and  the  abundance  of  which  makes  us  iind  even 
.  iii  a  Reineke  an  inexpressible  relief. 

But  what  we  most  thoroughly  value  in  him  is  his 
capacity.  He  can  do  what  he  sets  to  work  to  do.  That 
l)Iind  instinct  with  which  the  world  shouts  and  claps  its 
hand  for  the  successful  man,  is  one  of  those  latent  im- 
pulses ill  us  which  are  truer  than  we  know  ;  it  is  the 
imiversal  confessional  to  which  Nature  leads  us,  and,  in 
h6r  intolerance  of  disguise  and  hypocrisy,  compels  us  to 
be  our  own  accusers.  Whoever  can  succeed  in  a  o;iven 
condition  of  society,  can  succeed  only  in  virtue  of  ful- 
filling the  terms  which  society  exacts  of  him  ;  and  if  he 
can  fulfil  them  triumphantly,  of  course  it  rewards  him 
and  praises  him.  He  is  what  the  rest  of  the  world  would 
be,  if  their  powers  were  equal  to  their  desires.  lie  has 
accomplished  what  they  all  are  vaguely,  and  with  imper- 
fect consistency,  struggling  to  accomplish  ;  and  the 
character  of  the  conqueror — the  means  and  aj^pliances 
by  which  he  has  climbed  up  that  great  pinnacle  on  which 
he  stands  victorious,  the  observed  of  all  observers,  is  no 
more  than  a  very  exact  indicator  of  the  amount  of  real 
virtue  in  the  age,  out  of  which  he  stands  prominent. 

We  are  forced  to  acknowledge  that  it  was  not  a  very 
virtuous  age  in  which  Reineke  made  himself  a  great  man  ; 
but  that  was  the  fault  of  the  age  as  much  as  tlie  fault  of 
him.  His  nature  is  to  succeed  wherever  he  is.  If  the 
age  had  required  something  else  of  him,  then  he  would 
have  been  something  else.  Whatever  it  had  said  to 
him,  "  D(t,  and  Twill  niiike  v<>n  mvhero,"  that  Reineke 


278  SKETCHES  FROM  J.  A.  FROUDE. 

would  have  done.  No  appetite  makes  a  slave  of  him — 
no  faculty  refuses  obedience  to  his  will.  His  entire 
natm-e  is  under  perfect  organic  control  to  the  one  su- 
preme authority.  And  the  one  object  for  which  he 
lives,  and  for  which,  let  his  lot  have  been  cast  in  what- 
ever century  it  might,  he  would  always  have  lived,  is  to 
rise,  to  thrive,  to  prosper,  and  become  great. 

The  world  as  he  found  it  said  to  him — Prey  upon  us  ; 
we  are  your  oyster,  let  your  wit  open  us.  If  you  will 
only  do  it  cleverly — if  you  will  take  care  that  we  shall 
not  close  upon  your  fingers  in  the  process,  you  may 
devour  us  at  your  pleasure,  and  we  shall  feel  ourselves 
highly  honored.  Can  w^e  wonder  at  a  fox  of  Reineke's 
abilities  taking  such  a  world  at  its  word  ? 

And  let  it  not  be  supposed  that  society  in  this  earth 
of  ours  is  ever  so  viciously  put  together,  is  ever  so  totally 
without  organic  life,  that  a  rogue,  unredeemed  by  any 
merit,  can  prosper  in  it.  There  is  no  strength  in  rotten- 
ness ;  and  when  it  comes  to  that,  society  dies  and  falls  in 
j)ieces.  Success,  as  it  is  called,  even  worldly  success,  is 
impossible,  without  some  exercise  of  what  is  called  moral 
virtue,  without  some  portion  of  it,  infinitesimally  small, 
perhaps,  but  still  some.  Courage,  for  instance,  steady 
self-confidence,  self-trust,  self-reliance — that  only  basis 
and  foundation-stone  on  which  a  strong  character  can 
rear  itself — do  we  not  see  this  in  Reineke  ?  While  he 
lives,  he  lives  for  himself  ;  but  if  he  comes  to  dying,  he 
can  die  like  his  l)etters  ;  and  his  wit  is  not  of  that 
effervescent  sort  which  will  fly  away  at  the  sight  of 
death  and  leave  him  panic-stricken.  It  is  true  there 
is  a  meaning  to  that  word  courage,  which  was  perhaps 
not  to  be  found  in  the  dictionary  in  which  Reineke 
studied.  "  I  hope  I  am  afraid  of  nothing,  Trim,"  said 
my  Uncle  Toby,  "  except  doing  a  wrong  thing."     With 


REYKARD    THE    FOX.  279 

Reineke  there  was  no  "  except."     His  digestive  powers 
shrank  from  no  action,  good  or  bad,  which  would  serve 
his  turn.     Yet  it  required  no  shght  measure  of  courage 
to  treat  his  fellow-creatures  with  the  steady  disrespect 
with    whicli     Reineke    treats    them.      To    walk    alono; 
among  them,  regardless  of  any  interest  but  his  own  ;  out 
.•"fof  mere  wantonness  to  liook  them  up  like  so  many  cock- 
'  chafers,    and    spin    tliem    for     his     pleasure  ;  not    like 
,-J)o"iitian,   with  an  imperial  army  to  hold  them  down 
^  during  the  operation,  but  with  no  other  assistance  but 
.  his  own  little  body  and  large  %vit  ;  it  was  something  to 
venture  upon.     And  a  world  which  would  submit  to  be 
so  treated,  what  could  he  do  but  despise  ? 
^     To  tlie  animals  utterly  below  ourselves,   external  to 
our  own  species,  we  hold  ourselves  bound  by  no  law. 
We  say  to"*them,  "wos  non  volns,  without  any  uneasy  mis- 
givings.    We  rob  the  bees  of  their  honey,  the  cattle  of 
their  lives,  tlie  horse  and  the  ass  of  their  liberty.      We 
kill  the  wild  animals  that  they  may  not  interfere  with 
our  pleasures  ;  and    acknowledge    ourselves    bound    to 
them  by  no  terms  except  what  are  dictated  by  our  own 
convenience.     And  why  should  Reineke  have  acknowl- 
edged an  obligation  any  more  than  we,  to  creatures  so 
utterly  below  himself  ?     He  was  so  clever,  as  our  friend 
said,  that  he  liad  a  right.     That  he  could  treat  them  so, 
Mr.  Carlyle  would  say,  proves  that  he  had  a  right. 

But  it  is  a  mistake  to  say  he  is  without  a  conscience. 
No  bold  creature  is  ever  totallv  without  one.  Even 
lago  shows  some  sort  of  conscience.  Respecting  nothing 
else  in  heaven  or  earth,  he  respects  and  even  reverences 
his  own  intellect.  After  one  of  those  sweet  interviews 
with  Roderigo,  his,  wliat  we  must  call  conscience,  takes 
him  to  account  for  his  company  ;  and  he  pleads  to  it  in 
his  own  justification — 


280  SKETCHES    FROM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

For  I  mine  own  gained  knowledge  should  'profane 
Were  I  to  waste  myself  with  such  a  snipe 
But  for  my  sport  and  profit. 

ReineTce,  if  we  take  the  mass  of  liis  misdeeds,  preyed 
chiefly,  like  our  own  Eobin  Hood,  on  rogues  who  were 
greater  rogues  than  himself.  If  Bruin  chose  to  steal 
Rusteviel's  honey,  if  Hintze  trespassed  in  the  priest's 
granary,  they  were  but  taken  in  their  own  evil-doings. 
And  what  is  Isegrim,  the  worst  of  Reineke's  victims, 
but  a  great  heavy,  stupid,  lawless  brute  ? — fair  type,  we 
will  suppose,  of  not  a  few  Front-de-Boeufs  and  other  so- 
called  nobles  of  the  poet's  era,  whose  will  to  do  mis- 
chief was  happily  limited  by  their  obtuseness.  We  re- 
member that  French  baron — Gilbert  de  Retz,  we  believe, 
was  his  name — who,  like  Isegrim,  had  studied  at  the 
universities,  and  passed  for  learned,  whose  after-dinner 
pastime  for  many  years,  as  it  proved  at  last,  was  to  cut 
children's  throats  for  the  pleasure  of  watching  them 
die.  We  may  well  feel  gratitude  that  a  Reineke  was 
provided  to  be  the  scourge  of  such  monsters  as  these  ; 
and  we  have  a  thorough  pure,  exuberant  satisfaction  in 
seeing  the  intellect  in  that  little  weak  body  triumph  over 
them  and  trample  them  down.  This,  indeed,  this  victory 
of  intellect  over  brute  force,  is  one  great  secret  of  our 
pleasure  in  the  poem,  and  goes  far,  in  the  Carlyle 
direction,  to  satisfy  us  that,  at  any  rate,  it  is  not  given  to 
mere  base  physical  strength  to  win  in  the  battle  of  life, 
even  in  times  when  physical  strength  is  apparently  the 
only  recognized  power. 

We  are  insensibly  falling  from  our  self-assumed  judicial 
office  into  that  of  advocacy  ;  and  sliding  into  what  may 
be  plausibly  urged,  rather  than  standing  fast  on  what  we 
can  surely  affirm.  Y(!t  there  are  cases  when  it  is  fitting 
for  the  judge  to  become  the  advocate  of  an  undefended 


REYNARD    THE    FOX.  381 

prisoner  ;  and  advocacy  is  only  plausible  when  a  few 
words  of  truth  are  mixed  with  what  we  say,  like  the  few 
drops  of  wine  which  color  and  faintly  flavor  the  large 
draught  of  water.  Such  few  grains  or  drops,  whatever 
they  may  be,  we  must  leave  to  the  kindness  of  Reynard's 
friends  to  distil  for  him,  while  we  continue  a  little 
-longer  in  the  same  strain. 

After  all,  it  may  be  said,  what  is  it  in  man's  nature 
which  is  really  admirable  ?  It  is  idle  for  us  to  waste  our 
^  labor  in  passing  Reineke  through  the  moral  crucible  un- 
less we  shall  recognize  the  results  M'hen  we  obtain  them  ; 
and  in  these  moral  sciences  our  analytical  tests  can  only 
be  obtained  by  a  study  of  our  own  internal  experience. 
If  we  desire  to  know  what  we  admire  in  Reineke,  we 
must  look  for  what  we  admire  in  ourselves.  And  what 
is  that  ?  Is-  it  what  on  Sundays,  and  on  set  occasions, 
and  when  we  are  mounted  on  our  moral  stilts,  we  are 
pleased  to  call  goodness,  probity,  obedience,  humility  ? 
Is  it  ?  Is  it  really  ?  Is  it  not  rather  the  face  and  form 
which  nature  made — the  strength  which  is  ours,  we 
know  not  how — our  talents,  our  rank,  our  possessions  ? 
It  appears  to  us  that  we  most  value  in  ourselves  and  most 
admire  in  our  neighbor,  not  acquisitions,  but  gifts.  A 
man  does  not  praise  himself  for  being  good.  If  he 
praise  himself  he  is  not  good.  The  lirst  condition  of 
goodness  is  forgetfulness  of  self  ;  and  where  self  has 
entered,  under  however  plausible  a  form,  the  health  is 
but  skin-deep,  and  underneath  there  is  corruption.  And 
so  through  everything  ;  wc  value,  we  are  vain  of,  proud 
of,  or  whatever  you  please  to  call  it,  not  what  M'e  have 
done  for  ourselves,  but  what  has  been  done  for  us — what 
has  been  given  to  us  by  the  up})er  powers.  "We  look  up 
to  high-born  men,  to  wealthy  men,  to  fortunate  men,  to 
clever  men.     Is  it  not  so  ?     AVhom  do  we  choose  for  the 


282  SKETCHEvS    FKOM    J.   A.   FROUDE. 

coinitj  member,  the  magistrate,  the  officer,  the 
minister  ?  Tlie  good  man  we  leave  to  the  humble  en- 
joyment of  his  goodness,  and  we  look  out  for  the  able, 
or  the  wealthy.  And  again  of  the  wealthy,  as  if  on 
every  side  to  witness  to  the  same  universal  law,  the  man 
who  with  no  labor  of  his  own  has  inherited  a  fortune, 
ranks  higher  in  the  world's  esteem  than  his  father  who 
made  it.  We  take  rank  by  descent.  Such  of  us  as  have 
the  longest  pedigree,  and  are  therefore  the  farthest  re- 
moved from  the  first  who  made  the  fortune  and  founded 
the  family,  we  are  the  noblest.  The  nearer  to  the  foun- 
tain  the  fouler  the  stream  ;  and  that  first  ancestor,  who  has 
soiled  his  fingers  by  labor,  is  no  better  than  a  parvenu. 

And  as  it  is  with  what  we  value,  so  it  is  with  what  we 
blame.  It  is  an  old  story,  that  there  is  no  one  who 
would  not  in  his  heart  prefer  being  a  knave  to  being  a 
fool  ;  and  when  we  fail  in  a  piece  of  attempted  roguery, 
as  Coleridge  has  wisely  observed,  though  reasoning  un- 
wisely from  it,  we  lay  the  blame,  not  on  our  own  moral 
nature,  for  which  we  are  responsible,  but  on  our  intel- 
lectual, for  which  we  are  not  responsible.  We  do  not 
say  what  knaves,  we  say  what  fools,  we  have  been  ;  per- 
plexing Coleridge,  who  regards  it  as  a  phenomenon  of 
some  deep  moral  disorder  ;  whereas  it  is  but  one  more 
evidence  of  the  universal  fact  that  gifts  are  the  true  and 
proper  object  of  appreciation  ;  and  as  we  admire  men  for 
possessing  gifts,  so  we  blame  them  for  their  absence. 
The  noble  man  is  the  gifted  man  ;  the  ignoble  is  the 
ungifted  ;  and  therefore  we  have  only  to  state  a  simple 
law  in  siinple  language  to  have  a  full  solution  of  the 
enigma  of  Eeineke.  He  has  gifts  enough  ;  of  that,  at 
least,  there  can  be  no  doubt  ;  and  if  he  lacks  the  gift  to 
use  them  in  the  way  which  we  call  good,  at  least  he  uses 
them  successfully.     His  victims  are  less  gifted  than  he, 


REYKARD    THE    FOX.  283 

and  therefore  less  noble  ;  and  therefore  he  has  a  right  to 
use  them  as  lie  pleases. 

And,  after  all,  what  are  these  victims  ?  Among  the 
heaviest  charges  which  were  urged  against  him  was  the 
killing   and   eating    of   that   wretched    Scharfenebbe — 

. .-;Sharpbeak — the  crow's  wife.     It  is  well  that  there  are 

'  two  sides  to  every  story.     A  poor  weary  fox,  it  seemed, 

v.was  not  to  l)e  allowed  to  enjoy  a  quiet  sleep  in  the  sun- 

^  tshine  but  what  an  unclean  carrion  bird  must  come  down 
and  take  a  peck  at  him.  We  can  feel  no  sympathy  with 
the  outcries  of  the  crow  husband  over  the  fate  of  the 
unfortunate  Sliarpbeak.     Wofully,  he  says,  he  flew  over 

'  the  place  where,  a  few  moments  before,  in  tJie  glory  of 
glossy  plumage,  a  loving  wife  sat  croaking  out  her  pas- 
sion for  him,  and  found  nothing — nothing  but  a  little 
blood  and  a  few  torn  feathers — all  else  clean  gone  and 
utterly  abolished.  AVell,  and  if  it  was  so,  it  was  a  blank 
prospect  for  him,  but  the  earth  was  well  rid  of  her  ;  and 
for  herself,  it  was  a  higher  fate  to  be  assimilated  into 
the  body  of  Reineke  than  to  remain  in  a  miserable  indi- 
viduality to  be  a  layer  of  carrion  crow's  eggs. 

And  then  for  Bellyn,  and  for  Bruin,  and  for  Ilintze, 
and  the  rest,  who  would  needs  be  meddling  with  what 
was  no  concern  of  theirs — what  is  there  in  them  to  chal- 
lenge either  regret  or  pity  ?  They  made  love  to  their 
occupation. 

'Tis  dangerous  when  the  baser  nature  falls 
Between  the  pass  and  fell  incensed  points 
Of  micfhty  opposites  : 
They  lie  not  near  our  conscience. 

Ah  !  if  they  were  all.  But  there  is  one  misdeed,  one 
which  outweighs  all  others  whatsoever — a  crime  which  it 
is  useless  to  palliate,  let  our  other  friend  say  what  he 


ii84  SKETCHES    FROM   J.   A.   FROUDE. 

pleased  ;  and  Reineke  himself  felt  it  so.  It  sat  heavy, 
for  Jiim,  on  his  soul,  and  alone  of  all  the  actions  of  his 
life  we  are  certain  that  he  wished  it  undone — the  death 
and  eating  of  that  poor  foolish  Lampe,  the  hare.  It  was 
a  paltry  revenge  in  Reineke.  Lampe  had  told  tales  of 
him  ;  he  had  complained  that  Reineke,  under  pretence 
of  teaching  him  his  Catechism,  had  seized  him  and  tried 
to  murder  him  ;  and  though  he  provoked  his  fate  by 
thrusting  himself,  after  such  a  warning,  into  the  jaws  of 
Malepartus,  Reineke  betrays  an  uneasiness  about  it  in 
confession  ;  and,  unlike  himself,  feels  it  necessary  to 
make  some  sort  of  an  excuse. 

Grimbart,  the  badger,  Reineke's  father  confessor, 
had  been  obliged  to  speak  severely  of  the  seriousness  of 
the  offence.      "  You  see,"  Reineke  answers  : 

To  help  oneself  out  through  the  world  is  a  queer  sort  of  business  : 
one  cannot 

Keep,  you  know,  quite  altogether  as  pure  as  one  can  in  the  clois- 
ter. 

When  we  are  handling  honey  we  now  and  then  lick  at  our  fingers. 

Lampe  sorely  provoked  me  ;  he  frisked  about  this  way  and  that 
way, 

Up  and  down,  under  my  eyes,  and  he  looked  so  fat  and  so  jolly. 

Really  I  could  not  resist  it.     I  entirely  forgot  how  I  loved  him. 

And  then  he  was  so  stupid. 

But  even  this  acknowledgment  does  not  satisfy 
Reineke.  His  mind  is  evidently  softened,  and  it  was 
on  that  occasion  that  he  poured  out  his  pathetic  lamenta- 
tion over  the  sad  condition  of  the  world — so  fluent,  so 
musical,  so  touching,  that  Grimbart  listened  with  wide 
eyes,  unable,  till  it  had  run  to  tlie  length  of  a  sermon,  to 
collect  himself.  It  is  true  that  at  last  his  office  as 
ghostly  father  obliged  him  to  put  in  a  slight  de- 
murrer : 


REYN"ARD   THE    FOX.  2S?} 

Uncle,  the  badger  replied,  why,  these  are  the  sins  of  your  neigh- 
bors ; 

Yours,  I  should  think,  were  sufficient,  and  rather  more  now  to  the 
purpose. 

..-     But  he  sighs  to  think  what  a  bishop  Reineke  would 
have  made. 

'>  And  now,  for  the  present,  farewell  to  Reineke  Fuchs, 
and  to  the  song  in  which  his  glory  is  enshrined,  the 
Welt-Bibel — Bible  of  this  world — as  Goethe  called  it, 
-the  most  exquisite  moral  satire,  as  we  will  call  it,  which 
has  ever  been  composed.  It  is  not  addressed  to  a  passing- 
mode  of  folly  or  of  profligacy,  but  it  touches  the  peren- 
nial nature  of  mankind,  laying  bare  our  own  sympathies, 
aAd  tastes,  and  weaknesses,  with  as  keen  and  true  an 
edge  as  when  the  living  world  of  the  old  Swabian  poet 
winced  under  its  earliest  utterance. 

Humorous  in  the  liigh  pure  sense,  every  laugh  which 
it  gives  may  liave  its  echo  in  a  sigh,  or  may  ghde  into 
it  as  excitement  subsides  into  thought  ;  and  yet,  for 
those  who  do  not  care  to  find  matter  there  either  for 
thought  or  sadness,  may  remain  innocently  as  a  laugh. 

Too  strong  for  railing,  too  kindly  and  loving  for  the 
bitterness  of  irony,  the  poem  is,  as  the  world  itself,  a 
book  where  each  man  will  find  what  his  nature  enables 
him  to  see,  which  gives  us  back  each  our  own  image, 
and  teaches  us  each  the  lesson  which  each  of  us  desires 
to  learn. 


INDEX. 


A. 

Abonotichu*.  112 ;  becomes  a  lioly 
city,  136. 

iEscuLAPius  reappears,  115 ;  as  oracle 
and  deity,  117  ;  speaks  through  the 
serpent.  122. 

Africa,  South,  A  trip  to,  183. 

Alexandei!  of  Aboiiotichus,  107  ;  stud- 
ies medicine  and  magic,  109 ;  meets 
Cocconas,  109  ;  re-olves  on  relij^ious 
fraud,  110;  dismisses  bis  companion, 
119 ;  reappears  in  his  native  place, 
113;  work.s miracles,  11.5  ;  isdiflferent- 
ly  regarded,  119  ;  consulted  by  Roman 
society,  12:^ ;  establishes  a  temple, 
126 ;  invents  his  miraculous  birth, 
127 .  commits  dangerous  mistakes, 
128  :  is  finally  triumphant,  133. 

Animajl  creation.  The,  sacrificed  for 
man,  59. 

"  Answek,"  a  poem,  255. 

Apollonius  of  Tyana,  103 :  at  the 
Roman  court,  104  ;  as  a  healer  and  a 
magician,  lii5. 

Apprenticeship  iu  trades  in  Old  Eng- 
land, 170. 

Arbndal,  a  modern  town,  97. 

Aurelius,  Marcus,  128. 

Asia  Minor,  the  home  of  magicians, 
102. 

Asceticism,  Froude's  philosophy  of,  14. 


B. 


Bergen,  67  ;  its  flsh-trade,  6S  ;  univer- 
sal thrift,  68  ;  model  museum,  69  ; 
people,  70. 

Bishop,  A  Xorvv'egian,  82. 

Bloemfonteine,  220. 

BoLEYN,  Anne,  at  the  Tower,  17:j  ;  iu 
the  procession,  176  ;  at  Westminster 
Hall,  178  ;  crowned  by  Cranmer,  179. 

BuNYAN,  John,  his  end,  181 ;  last  words, 
182  ;  his  temperament,  183  ;  his  toler- 
ance, 185  ;  his  preaching,  186. 

Burke,  Father.  30. 

Business  principles,  common  but  false, 
52. 


"  C.E8AR,  a  sketch,"  19. 
Cagliostro,  a,  of  the  second  century, 
103. 


Cape  Town,  193 ;  its  surroundings, 
194. 

Capitat.  and  labor,  156 ;  their  gaina 
and  losses,  172. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  Reminiscences  of, 
19:  and  his  wife.  246  ;  reveals  himself 
to  Miss  Welsh,  250  ;  his  life  on  Dum- 
friesshire moors,  251  ;  temper,  252 ; 
views  of  men's  prospects,  254  ;  treat- 
ment of  his  wife,  2.55. 

Change,  a  universal  law,  136. 

Cheneys,  232  ;  the  old  church  at,  2;i4. 

Ches,  The,  235  ;  a  day's  fishing  in,  237. 

Christian  character,  A  plea  for,  22. 

Christian  Church,  The,  27  ;  against 
fraud,  121. 

Christiania,  its  attractions,  98. 

Christiansund,  90 ;  its  strange  cot- 
tages, 91. 

Churches,  Dutch,  in  South  Africa,  228. 

Circumstances.  Adverse,  useful  to 
strong  men,  40;  blamed  for  failure, 
51  ;  the  causes  of  virtue  and  vii  e.  262. 

Civilization,  what  is  it  ?  82  ;  primitive, 
228. 

Clement,  Pope,  on  Cellini's  murderB, 
274. 

CoccoNAS,  the  fortune-t'  Her,  109. 

Conservatism  in  Norway,  97. 

Criticism,  Unworthy,  30  ;  Irish,  31. 

"  Cui  Bono  ?"  a  poem,  254. 


D. 


Daviken,  82. 

Diamond  Fields,  215;  their  discovery, 

218  :   method  of  working  them,  218; 

not  a  benefl',  222. 
Drontheim,  how  to  reach  it,  71 ;    the 

home  of  the  Norse  kings,  86  ;  its  ca 

thedral,  87. 
Durban  in  Natal,  199. 
Dutch  hospitality,  228. 


E. 


East  London,  197. 

Ed L'c AT  ION  of  clergy  and  laity  iu  O'.d 

England,  165. 
"Elective  Affinities,"  opinion  of,  88. 
Electivb  franchise,   how    controlled, 

196. 
Engineering  work  in    South    .\fnra. 

19T. 


INDEX. 


387 


EngLwAND  In  the  sixteenth  century, 
136  ;  population  of,  138  ;  manufact- 
ures in,  140  ;  land  -  tenure  of,  144  ; 
sumptuary  laws  in,  148  ;  condition  of 
laborers  iu,  152  ;  wages  of,  155 ;  so- 
cial habits  of,  144  ;  education  in,  165. 

Epicurus  and  his  sect,  lii ;  aflEord  no 
moral  light,  134. 

Essays  of  the  author  left  out,  5. 


F. 


'Feudal  system,  Eegulations  of  the,  150. 

'Fishing,  at   Nord  Gulen,  76;   at   the 

Grea'  Fall,  7"  ;    at  StrOmen,  80  :   iu 

the  Romsdal  Fjord,  85  ;    Trondlijem 

1-.  Tjord,  89;  at  Oddi-,  96;  at  Cheneys, 

232. 

Fjords  same  as  friths.  63  ;  their  scen- 
ery, 64  ;  how  formed,  64  ;  their  depth, 
65  ;  difticulty  of  navigaiing,  66. 

Flok.*,  Tho,  of  Norway,  79. 

Fording  an  African  river,  221. 

Frkedoji  of  the  will,  21. 

Freeman,  Edward  A.,  7  ;  his  charges 
against  the  author,  30. 

Fboude,  James  Autlumy,  birthplace 
'  and  parentage,  5;  enters  college,  5  ; 
graduates  and  becomes  a  fellow,  6  ; 
ordained  a  deacon,  6 ;  eivt-s  up  fel- 
lowship and  orders,  6;  adopts  a  liter- 
ary career,  7  ;  controversy  with  Mr. 
Edward  A.  Freeman,  7;  his  es-ay  on 
John  Henry  Kewnian,  8  ;  the  author's 
boyhood,  10  ;  experience  with  Evan- 
gelical Chiisiiaus,  12;  his  literary 
workf,  Vi  ;  stndies  English  history, 
16;  pul>li.-his  twelve  volumes,  16; 
treatmeni  of  the  Irish,  IS;  publishes 
essays,  1!);  edits  Carlvle's  biography, 
19;  his  pliilDsophical  opinion-,  20; 
religious  faith,  2.'J;  theological  opin- 
ions, 24  ;  as  an  historical  writer,  26  ; 
his  agnosticism,  29;  his  tiavels.  29  ; 
his  conlroversies,  30;  his  style,  32. 

Froude,  Richard  Hurrell,  6;  the  au- 
thor's alleged  injustice  to,  31. 


G. 


Gpiranger  Fjord,  its  sublime  scenery, 

92. 
Glacial  action,  65  ;  at  Odde,  94. 
Gltcon,  Incarnation  of,  115. 
Government,  I'arenlal,  105. 


n. 


Hay-making  in  ^Torivay,  92. 

Uenky  VIII.  in  a  new  light,  17  ;  nurses 

niaunfacturcs,  140. 
IlKin-CiiuBcn  missions  in  South  Africa, 

221. 
Honesty  enforced  in  Old  England,  168. 
Hospitality,  Social,  in  Old  En^'l.ind, 

KM. 


Human    nature,    how    developed,    .56; 

how  influenced,  263. 
Hotchingson,    Hely,     his     prophetic 

question,  260. 


I. 


Incomes  of  the  old  English  nobility, 
162  ;  of  country  gentlemen,  163. 

Ireland,  The  English  in,  17;  cost  of 
reconquest,  256 ;  restrictions  upon 
her  manufactures  and  commerce,  257. 

Irish  attacks  upon  the  author,  31. 

Irving,  Edward,  246. 


Judgment  scene,  A,  58. 


K. 


Kafirs,  The,  201  ;  treatment  of  their 
women,  2o2 ;  their  musical  perform- 
ances, 202 ;  their  injudicious  treat- 
ment by  the  English,  202  ;  their  hou- 
ee^ty,  204  ;  their  clothing,  206. 

KlJIBERLT,   217. 


Land,  Tenure  of,  143. 
Leokof,  209. 

LiPE-PlCTURE,  45. 

Lightning  conductor.  A,  212. 

LuciAN,  lOG  ;  his  Bketchof  Alexander 
of  Abonotichus,  107;  his  opinion  of 
ancient  philosopher.^,  12o  ;  attempt.^ 
to  expose  Alexander,  130;  is  finally 
imposed  upon,  132;  lands  at  Bithynia, 
133  ;  fails  to  move  the  governor,  13-3. 


M. 


Macaulay's  alleged  injustice,  16;  his 
singular  theory,  202. 

Macuiaveli.i,  262. 

M\NDAL,  its  historic  associations,  97. 

MANurACTURKs  in  Old  England  nursed 
by  statute,  140  ;  spreading  over  the 
country,  143;  in  South  Africa,  want- 
ing, 226. 

Mahitzhurg,  204 

Mii.iTAitY  i)rincip!e  in  land  tenure,  144. 

Money,  value  of,  155. 

MoKALiTV,  essential  to  success,  278. 

Mormon  fraud,  Type  of,  112. 


N. 


Natal,  109;  its  climate,  201;  i)opula- 
tion,  201  ;  caiihcs  ol  niisgoverninent, 
203;  rcmcdv  i-  r  ii'iprovement.  2i  8. 

"  Ne.>ik.sis  of  Failh  The,"  II  ;  its  plot 
15  ;  ilB  twolo.'d  reception    16. 

New  Bedford.  228. 


288 


INDEX. 


Newman,  John  Henry,  fi  ;  liighiftorian, 
8. 

NoRD  Fjord,  78 

NoRU  Giilen,  a  primitive  Norwegian 
valley,  73. 

NousE  history  made  intelligible,  72. 

Norsemen,  The,  their  knowledge  and 
our  own,  101. 

North  Sea,  The,  stormy,  97. 

Norway  Fjords,  The,  6:J-t01. 

Norway,  A  trip  to,  62  ;  routes  of  travel, 
63 ;  from  the  Solent  to  Udsire,  66 ; 
on  the  ocean,  67 ;  at  Bergen.  68 ; 
its  religion,  69 ;  Giilen,  73  ;  primitive 
life  in,  7.5  ;  its  etnrdy  population,  76  ; 
to  the  Nord  Fjord,  78  ;  at  the  Stro- 
men,  80 ;  to  Daviken,  82  ;  in  the  Roms- 
dal  Fjord,  83  ;  to  Trondhjem,  86  :  ex- 
ploring the  fjord,  87 ;  to  Christian- 
sund,  90 ;  at  the  Geiranger  Fjord.  92  ; 
at  the  Odde  Fjord.  93  :  to  Christiania, 
96;  home  to  Cowes,  101. 


O. 


Odde  Fjord,  92  ;  its  wild  and  grand  as- 

pect!=,  04. 
Othello  the  Moor,  263. 
"  Oxford  Counter-reformation,  The," 

10  ;   expresses  the  author's  bent  of 

thinking,  2.5. 
Oxford  Movement,  The,   6 ;    its  two 

groups,  9. 


Political  economy  in  the  eighteenth 

century,  256. 
Population,  Increase  of,  139. 
Port  Elizabeth,  196. 
potscheffstrom,  213. 
Pretoria,  213. 
Produce  of  the  land  in  Old  England, 

1.51. 
Production  called  for,  50. 
l^ROTESTANTisM,  its  basis,  23. 
Provisions,  Prices  of,  in  Old  England, 

152. 
Pythagoreans,  The,  120. 


E 


Railway  station.  \  Kidini;  at  a,  41. 

Rbinekb  Fuchs,  its  meaning,  267. 

Religion  the  outgrowth  of  conscience, 
135  ;  of  Homer  and  the  Greek  dra- 
matists, 191  ;  of  the  Boers,  192. 

Reynard  the  fox,  262. 

RoLLo's  ancestral  home,  83. 

Romanism,  its  dangers,  26;  eulogy  of, 
27. 

R')Msdal  Fjord,  83  ;  its  geological  in- 
terest, 84. 

Rum  and  brandy,  as  civilizers,  189. 

ItuTu.iAN  consults  the  oracle,  124  ; 
inairies  the  daughter  of  Selene,  125. 


S. 


Schoolmaster's  salary,  A  Norwegian, 
82. 

Science  and  religion.  22. 

Sectarianism  exemplified  and  re- 
buked, 224. 

Seneca  as  a  man  and  philosopher,  88. 

Serpent,  The.  as  a  Fymbol,  113. 

Severian  consults  the  oracle,  122. 

Sheep-farming  in  Old  England  re- 
stricted, 159. 

Snake  story.  A,  202. 

iOGNE  Fjord,  64  ;  its  depth,  66  ;  grand 
scenery,  72. 

South  EY,  Governor,  219  ;  his  mistakem 
policy,  220. 

Spinoza,  20. 

Sport,  Sense  of,  241. 

St.  Neot,  Life  of,  13. 

St.  Olaf,  87. 

St.  Vincent,  190. 

StrOmen.  At  the,  78. 

Style,  The  author's,  a  masterpiece  of 
writing,  32  ;  specimen  extracts,  33-40. 

Sumptuary  laws,  148. 

Sunday  in  Norway,  81 ;  no  Sabbatari- 
anism, 98. 


T. 


Thunder-Storm,  a  South  African,  216. 
"  Times  of  Erasmus  and  Lnther,"  24. 
Tory,  Au  English,  in  Nonvay,  84. 
TouRLSTS  encountered,  93. 
Town  organizations  in  Old   England, 

167. 
Trabancho,    223 ;    the   king   and   his 

court,  224. 
Trade   associations    in  Old  England, 

168. 
Trade-winds,  192. 
Trondh.jem  (see  Drontheim). 
TUNBRIDGB,  230. 


Vikikg's  ship.  A,  99. 
Villanagb  in  Old  England,  145. 


W. 

Wages  in  Old  England  received  by  all. 
49. 

Wealth  not  the  aim  of  a  nation,  193. 

Welsh,  Miss  Jane,  246 ;  resolves  to 
marry  Carlyle.  248  ;  makes  a  full  con- 
fession, 249  ;  visits  the  Carlyles,  251; 
her  married  life,  251  ;  experience  at 
Crai^enputtock,  2.53;  her  views  of 
life,  2,55. 

Wesleyan  mission  station,  223. 

Work  the  condition  of  life,  48. 

Working  classes  in  Old  England,  Con- 
dition of  the,  151  ;  their  wages,  156. 


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